


Project: Legend

by ResiGamerGirl



Series: Power of Sin trilogy [3]
Category: Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Series
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-18
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-04-27 00:08:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 46,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5026021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ResiGamerGirl/pseuds/ResiGamerGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Final book of a trilogy. Continuing RE5 AU. Includes many original characters and game characters (older and newer). The story begins six years after the second book's epilogue, chapters from the past included. </p>
<p>The present year is 2018. In the past, viruses leaked to the black market. In the present, bio-weapon threats are at an all time low. But when the existence of an old project comes to light, the resulting revelation may not be one humanity can survive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Place Where all Stories End

_Boulder, Colorado_

Things weren't supposed to be this way. At 26 years old, Eva Jane Wesker had hoped to be married with a family. She'd only managed to get part of that right. Her straight blonde hair had grown long, cascading down over her shoulders, and gradually she allowed her outfits to change from more than just black and zero other color. She still wasn't very good with variety but she didn't feel she needed to be. Like at the moment, she was wearing a typical outfit of hers which included a black leather jacket that reached to her knees. Other than the jacket, everything else was anything but black. She wore a white tank top with thin straps under the jacket, tan pants, and blue and white sneakers. Oh, and her necklace.

A hand moved up to clasp the diamond choker around her neck. The item was expensive, priceless really, an heirloom of his deceased mother. Blue eyes glistened with tears which she fought desperately to hold back. So much time had passed and yet she wasn't nearly over it. "It" being the death of one Chris Redfield, the giver of her necklace. The man had given it to her, despite her protests against receiving such a beautiful object, after the first time they were intimate with one another, the first time they'd made love. A spur of the moment happening and yet he had had the item on him. He'd been carrying it and Eva realized then that he had been thinking about her all the time they were apart as she had been thinking of him.

Age just hadn't seemed to matter any longer. Not after they discovered and felt the deep connection between them after all the years spent apart. It was like they had always been meant to be together. She wasn't sure if she believed in that kind of thing, "soulmates", but Eva couldn't deny the intense closeness she felt to Chris. Had felt, past tense. He was gone now. He'd been gone for a long time. In three months it would be six years.

Her fingers reached forward and traced the date of birth and then the date of death carved in the stone slab she knelt before. The date of death was what really stood out for her. 'August 15, 2012.' If anyone saw the grave with the years 1973 to 2012, they would have figured he'd lived to the age of 39. No one would ever suspect that Chris Redfield had ceased aging any longer at the age of 35 after becoming infected with a virus.

The R-Virus or Regenerative virus had halted his physical aging and allowed him to heal from non-mortal wounds faster than any normal human. He had been invincible from death, too, until his run-in with a machine which passed him continuously through time. When he finally landed back in his proper time he was considerably weakened, and by complete accident, learned he could die now like any other human being. The man had retained his healing capabilities and lack of aging but was mortal in the sense that he could be killed. If Eva hoped that would deter the man from getting himself involved in dangerous situations, she had been massively mistaken. And really, she should have known better.

She'd gotten to know him over a span of four months in the year 2009 and learned of his past during that time. Chris had always been throwing himself into danger in order to save lives and protect the world. Why she thought he would change when he was technically tougher with his ability to say, heal a broken arm in a matter of hours, she didn't know. Eva blamed that belief on her still strong desire to live a normal life. She had hoped when she turned her life into something safer, he would follow. Even though it had been the preferable option, she hadn't held it against him when he told her he planned to continue his vendetta against bio-weapons. He had told her this during the five weeks she'd gotten with him when she'd returned after three years apart. Five weeks, it wasn't nearly enough time.

Tears leaked out from the corners of glassy eyes and she let her hand drop back to her side. She didn't know why she came here. It wasn't like Chris was actually buried in the earth beneath her. There had been no body to bury. But the blood, oh God, the blood. She had reviewed the crime scene photographs over and over, and the blood had been everywhere. It was like someone drained him of pints and pints of blood, letting him bleed painstakingly slowly to his eventual death. Eva's right hand clenched tight into a fist. If she had any idea, even a hint of who had done this to her love, she would have made it her life's mission to see them dead in turn.

"Eva, hey."

She wiped the fallen tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand quickly and turned to look over her shoulder. Claire Redfield was standing just a yard away, smiling gently down at her. Next to her was Leon S. Kennedy with the generic 'I'm uncomfortable but here for you' type expression on his face. He hadn't known Chris very well but knew how much the man had meant to the significant other in his life, Claire, and of course how close Eva had been to him. Despite his discomfort with the grieving women around him, he came every year with Claire. The decision made to come to his gravestone each year on the anniversary, it was a ritual they'd established pretty much automatically.

They were a little early this year in their visitation because Leon had an upcoming obligation to a new assignment, the details confidential of course. But he'd wanted to be here. Ever since Chris died, Claire and Leon had taken their relationship seriously it would seem. Instead of being on and off like Eva knew they usually were, when Claire's brother died, the two of them had been together ever since. It was a nice thought, a death uniting two people obviously perfect for one another, but she couldn't stop the bitterness that came with the thought either. Claire and Leon got to be together for over five years straight now, and Eva had barely gotten five weeks with Chris before he died. It wasn't fair.

"Hi Claire, Leon."

"Hi Eva," the government agent said to her. "How are you holding up?"

"I am and that has to be enough."

Leon followed her gaze to where it wandered over to a pair of forms sitting in the grass a good three yards behind the grave marker, then he was looking at her again.

"How often have you been coming here, Eva?"

"Does it matter?"

He pushed. "It does."

"Once a month at least."

Eva felt, rather than saw, him come to crouch down beside her. Her gaze was now back on the lettering written across the stone. 'Chris Redfield. Eternally fighting for a better world.' She liked the ring to it. Made it seem as though his fight was not over yet and continued on in the afterlife.

"You've gotta stop this. You've got to stop coming here so much."

"Don't tell me what to do."

"It's been nearly six years, Eva. He's gone."

Anger flared through her and she shot up onto her feet, fast, spinning around to face him.

"Don't you think I know that? I know. The only man I've ever loved is dead. I know! And I am living the best way I know how!"

She stopped her furious rant abruptly when her gaze momentarily swept past Leon's shoulder. Claire was crying. Silent tears were streaming down her face unrestrained. She ignored them both and walked over to the grave, taking the place Eva only recently abandoned in favor of releasing pent up frustration and grief. Eva stepped more out of her way and lowered her eyes, feeling ashamed for the outburst in such a place as a cemetery.

Her eyes lifted slightly to watch Claire place a bouquet of flowers in front of the grave, next to Eva's own bunch. Eva always went out of her way to find the flowers she brought to him each visit. She felt she could give him nothing less than blue orchids and so there they lay, fresh with color greatly contrasting the dreary gray of the stone it rested against. Without meaning to, she found herself talking out loud what she'd been thinking about after Leon's words to her.

"Every time I come here, I tell myself I won't come again. But I always find myself here in about four weeks. The longest I've ever gone between visits is six weeks. I feel drawn to this place. I don't know why. It's silly, I know that."

"It's not silly, Eva. You're sad and that's perfectly natural. I'm still sad, too."

"Yeah but Leon's right. It has been so long since he died and I can't seem to get past it. I can't seem to accept that he's dead even though I know it's the truth. I know it and yet I feel like he's out there. Like he'll come walking through the door at home at any moment."

"Oh Eva..." Claire trailed off, sympathy evident in her expression.

She quickly switched the subject. "Wesker's been calling me."

"Your dad?" Claire appeared surprised, her big eyes squinting as her forehead creased in a deep frown. "What did he want?"

"I don't know, said something about wanting to talk. I hung up. I don't want to talk to that man and I made it clear for six years that I didn't want to see him. He's always abided by my wishes. Never once has he come around."

Her father, Albert Wesker, had reverted back to his old ways, experimenting on the innocent and working towards the eventual goal of a forced evolution unto mankind. Even while she'd been with him those years ago, fighting to rid the world of Umbrella and then fighting to stop Darius Greene's spiral into insanity that would destroy the world, he'd been working on his plotting already. Eva never wanted people to change from anything than what they were, but she refused to believe Wesker could be truly evil. There had to be some good in him and there had to be a way to make it come out, permanently. The answer to it escaped her right now though. So as of the first time she learned what he was up to about seven years ago, she'd stopped speaking to him much and never told him anything personal. After all, her own father stood for everything the man she loved stood against.

"Okay...?"

Eva could tell the other woman didn't seem sure where she was going with this. She wasn't sure herself so she shook off that train of thinking and just kept talking.

"He's never called me so often though. Maybe he has something important to say, I don't see how... I don't know why I brought it up. Never mind, just forget I said anything."

"If that's what you want," said Claire, looking slightly perturbed.

She hadn't really known why she'd said anything at all. On the days when she came to visit Chris's grave, she was always more vulnerable and open to talking. Otherwise, she was the picture perfect image of closed off and quiet. There were a few people where she worked that she talked to, but steadily Eva had been growing apart from them. It was easier to immerse herself in her work rather than try and pretend she could go to dinner or for a drink with co-workers that could never possibly understand the truth if they ever found it out. And since she'd lost Chris, she had also been taking part in some fieldwork. Fieldwork which her co-workers thought she was crazy for doing. They much preferred the comfort and safety of the lab where they all worked. She couldn't blame them for not understanding, the work outside of the lab kept her busier and her mind more occupied. It was a temporary salvation from her grief.

A powerful cough racked her body, startling even her after coming on so suddenly, and Claire stood to clap a hand against her back.

"Are you okay?"

Eva smothered down the coughs and swallowed, lifting her head back up from where it had come to rest against her chest.

"Yeah, fine. Just a bit of a cold. It's been bothering me for a while. No big deal."

Claire nodded and glanced away before astonishment took over her face. "Leon! Wha-what are you doing?"

The 40-year-old man had moved away from the grave and was now down on one knee, facing Claire. He looked terribly nervous for one who was usually so calm and composed, having faced down numerous horrors during the course of his life. Oh yeah, and the guy held carefully in his hands, a small black box that was opened to reveal a ring. It was an engagement ring. Holy crap, Leon was proposing! The obvious fact rang through Eva's head as she gaped open-mouthed at the man.

Leon was babbling now. "I know, I know, this might seem morbid asking you here in a cemetery of all places, beside your brother's grave no less..."

The much younger of the other two looked on as big blue eyes locked onto Leon's own blue, the pair so obviously in love, lost in one another for a time. She knew what they were both thinking in that moment. They couldn't believe how incredibly lucky they were to have found one another and to be with that person. They were thinking there was no place else in the world they would rather be. Eva had had that once, with Chris. One whole glorious month and a week together. And it had been like they were in their own world the entire time, no distractions, only each other. That was over now and a new love had taken its place. The love, so distinct and powerful, between Claire and Leon.

She watched in amazement as Leon continued on in his proposal speech to Claire, who appeared incapable of removing her gaze from the symbol of a potential permanent future with her significant other.

"But morbid though it may be, it seemed fitting..somehow. Claire, your brother, him dying so suddenly, it just got me thinking. There is a lot of danger in this world, you and I know this better than most. And something could happen at any time. So I don't want to waste another minute not knowing whether we'll end up together or apart. I want to settle this once and for all because I know what I want it to be. I love you, Claire Redfield, and I want to be with you the rest of my life. I'm done being so uncertain of myself and I am ready to..settle down or however it means when... Ugh, what I'm trying to say is that I know I've taken my job before everything else, but not any more."

"Leon..." breathed Claire, eyes shining with tears of joy instead of sorrow which had occupied her so fully not long ago.

"I want to put you first."

"Do you mean that?"

Claire sounded like she wanted to believe.

"Job be damned." Leon declared.

This brought out a laugh from the light-hearted girl. "Well you already know my answer, Leon."

"Yes?"

"There never was any other answer."

"So it's a yes? Please, I need to hear you say it for my own, let's say, peace of mind."

She laughed again and Eva had to stifle her own smile at Leon's suffering over the lack of a definitive response. But she wasn't one to inflict negative feelings on anybody so she soon granted Leon reprieve.

"Yes, of course, yes. I love you, Leon Scott Kennedy. I always have."

He grinned, and instead of waiting to do the regulatory ring on the girl's finger bit, he jumped up and pulled her into his arms. They kissed long and hard, passion evident throughout, causing Eva to flash back to the last time she kissed someone. It had been Chris who was that someone. Naturally it was Chris. There never had been anyone else for her. She'd known it then and she still knew it now. She loved him. More than the world itself she sometimes thought. But she'd held on to herself as an individual and remained in this life for two reasons, two very huge, important, and meaningful reasons.

Reasons that made her aware she couldn't afford to be hell-bent on revenge, against the one or ones who had taken her love away. Her eyes moved off of the happy couple still enveloped into each other, and found the young pair waiting so patiently on the grass a few yards behind Chris's gravestone. They were so quiet and respectful, and at such a very young age. A boy and a girl, each of them five years old. Fraternal twins, her twins, her children.

Far more intelligent than what was normal, even Eva, inexperienced in motherhood as she was, could tell this. The superior intelligence could easily have been inherited from her, but their very demeanor was so peculiar and hard to believe. The only way she could think to put it was that they were wise, seeming to know things that she didn't think children could usually acknowledge and understand. But they did and one of those things was these common visits to the cemetery. Each time she came here she told them they could go and play for a while but every time they instead sat quietly beside one another, waiting until she'd concluded her visit.

Two children, keeping Chris alive by being alive themselves. Children of a man who never got the chance to be a father. He never even had the chance to know he was going to be a father. Eva walked over to Claire and Leon, hugging the now betrothed woman to show she was happy for her new happiness. Then after a little awkward should they or shouldn't they kind of shuffle, she embraced Leon.

"You two are going to be so happy together. This is a good thing. This is a really good thing." Eva told them with a smile after taking a step back from the two.

Then she went over to be with her children and hugged them each in turn for no reason whatsoever that they could probably foresee. But it didn't matter. She just wanted to do it because she could. Because they were real and tangible and she wanted to feel that she could touch them to confirm they remained present and existing. They both accepted the show of affection and it was as though they knew why she needed it.

Her oldest, born three minutes before the other, raised hazel eyes up to regard her. "It's okay, Mommy."

She startled a bit at the words and looked down at her son. "Of course it is, D. Of course everything is okay. Everything is okay."

Eva repeated the phrase, knowing it was more for herself than for either of her children. She chose that moment to regard them both. Her oldest, the male of the family, was the first her eyes lingered over. His name was Donovan Christopher Redfield. The surname had always been of particular liking to her and she couldn't bear to ever use Chris's name on a regular basis so she'd given it to her son as a middle name instead. Not that that had helped much. As the years went by and Donovan got older, more and more he grew to look like the man he would have known as his father. The boy was only five years old but he had the same brown hair and the same brown-green eyes as Chris had. Add to those physical attributes, his expressions resembled Chris's as well, down to the frowning glare whenever he got concerned or upset, that had really become trademark to the deceased father of her children.

But she loved him anyway and eventually learned to look past how much he reminded her of Chris in order to see him by his own identity, as the whole other person he was entirely. He was given the nickname of D from his sister. The two virtually spent all of their time together and one day came to Eva, announcing they were now to be referred to as D and Al. D for Donovan and Al for Aly, her daughter. Her full name was Aly Jane Redfield, named after both of her parents. Of course they hadn't made the nickname request in such a proper and mature manner, the fraternal twins having been four years old at the time. The request had come as a surprise nevertheless but Eva was actually glad to abide by it since that way their real names weren't exposed out in public to anyone who could be watching them without their best interests in mind. She doubted anyone bothered to keep an eye on her. No one probably knew she existed really, not after Umbrella had faded into the past and to obscurity.

An arm reached out and wrapped around her legs in a sort of tender hold, a soft head coming to rest against her side. Eva lowered her eyes to find her daughter clinging to her and looking at her with an unsure smile. Aly had dark brown hair identical to her brother, barely reaching over thin shoulders. The child had received her mother's eyes though, blue, plus the green of the virus courtesy of her father. Eva continued looking down at her, contemplating how the virus would work in her two children considering so far they had aged normally. Then her daughter saw she had attention and chose the moment to say something.

"Time to go home?"

Eva smiled at her, taking her little hand and enclosing it into her own as she fought to push back threatening tears caused by knowing she would once again be leaving without the man she loved by her side. She had spent years in denial of his death and then several more just trying to accept that he was gone forever. Staring down at her daughter's young and innocent face, she knew then Leon was right. Her children were in the here and now and it was time to let Chris go. There was no sense in lingering on the hope of a future that could never be.


	2. With and Without

_Sterling, Colorado_

The insistent beeping of the bedside alarm clock woke her from a deep sleep. She slapped a hand over the snooze button and peeled an eye open, fighting to rid herself of the sleepiness which sought to overtake her. After finally winning the battle, she propped herself onto one elbow and eyed the clock. 5:15, far too early to be awake in the world in her opinion, not that her opinion mattered. She had work to get to and kids to take care of. Motherhood... Eva shook her head sideways once and released a quiet laugh. It was still hard to believe, even after all this time, that she was a mother of two.

She heard a soft, barely audible scraping noise at the door of her room. Looking over, she spotted her daughter lingering in the doorframe as though waiting for her to get up for the day. Eva swung her legs over the side of the bed, planting her feet firmly on the floor, and regarded Aly with a mixture of amusement and curiosity. Her daughter was like clockwork, each morning ready and waiting for her mom to start her day. Sometimes Eva wondered how much her children ever really slept.

Most of the time when she saw her kids they were wide awake, no trace of tiredness visible in the slightest. Sometimes she wondered if maybe, maybe the virus had an effect on them that was different than what she herself had once experienced when she'd had the Regenerative virus running through her veins. Different even from Chris, who had had an altered strain of the R-Virus within him after a machine changed its composition. After all, Aly and Donovan were born with their virus, the first to ever be.

Eva gestured for Aly to come and her daughter seemed pleased, running over to wrap warm arms around her waist as a greeting. All thoughts of viral infection left her when the five-year-old pulled back and looked up at her with big hazel eyes glowing.

"Can we have pancakes today, Mommy? Pleeease."

She rolled her eyes. The girl was addicted to pancakes.

"We had pancakes yesterday, Al. Don't you think we should try something else today?"

"Pancakes!"

This latest exclamation had come from her other child. With both of them now ecstatic over the idea of eating pancakes for breakfast, Eva knew there was no winning against them today.

"Alright, alright, settle down. You will get your pancakes. But first, get dressed, both of you get going now."

"And you'll make the pancakes?" Aly asked.

"Mhm, now go."

Two pairs of feet scurried out of the room and on down the hallway to their shared room. Inseparable since birth and she liked to think that would never change. Siblings needed one another. It would have been nice to have had a sibling of her own so she wouldn't of spent most of her life alone and generally unsatisfied. She was satisfied now though. She had the family she'd always wanted. Well, she almost had it.

After dressing, taking great care, she placed the diamond necklace safely around her neck. To her it was the closest thing she could do to have Chris with her always. When she'd gathered her work satchel which contained numerous files and other papers, she slung her black leather jacket over the same arm holding the bag, and exited the bedroom. As soon as she entered the kitchen she checked the microwave for the time. It was a twenty minute drive to her Aunt Natasha's and another ten minutes to work from there.

Her primary reason for moving to Sterling had been her only relative that counted for something. She felt it would be wrong to deprive Natasha of the opportunity to spend time with her niece and aforementioned niece's kids. Plus, she'd missed her aunt too. A glance over into the sitting room area that branched off from the kitchen brought a smile to her face. Resting on the rectangular glass table in front of the sofa was a lamp with a blue flower design on it. The flowers were not orchids like she preferred, but it was the best Chris had been able to get for her at the time when he bought it.

She had gone back for the lamp, to that empty and ruined apartment in Collarson, Colorado. When things settled down a little anyway. When she was a hundred percent certain Umbrella Corporation was utterly ruined and gone from the face of the Earth, no longer a threat to her or anyone she cared about. The item held great meaning to her because of the one who bought the lamp, and every time she looked at it, she remembered what she had said to Chris the last night they spent in the apartment they'd chosen to lay low in with her father for a time.  
'Did you know orchids are said to have healing power? I wonder if they could heal your wounds, Chris... You know, the ones inside of you.'

The words had just come out, but she had meant them dearly. Chris was deeply afflicted with past tragedies, more than any one person should ever have to bear. She'd seen his pain and sometimes felt it as her own. Sometimes she pondered if that was part of what had drawn them together. That and of course all the bullshit they'd been put through.

She put her satchel and jacket down on a chair, setting to work on preparing the batter for the pancakes, switching the stove on at the same time. Eva watched as Aly and Donovan came into the kitchen, sitting quietly at the table as they waited to be fed. It was downright creepy sometimes, just how calm and well behaved the two could be. She was by no means an expert on children but she was fairly certain kids weren't supposed to act like adults three quarters of the time, right?

When the first of the pancakes were done, she plopped them with practiced ease onto a plate, and placed the plate on the counter beside the stove before turning back to make the rest. Her children loved pancakes and wanted them all the time so she'd become quite the expert on the creation of the soft, fluffy discs of tasty goodness. Yes, she liked pancakes a lot, too. Aly and Donovan just seemed to like them a bit more than what was probably healthy.

Another glance at the clock. It was six o'clock and she had to be to work by seven. Eva had to drop the kids off at her aunt's yet but she figured that left her with a good half hour to feed the kids and get them into the car. Finished making pancakes, she turned off the stove and put the used kitchenware in the sink. Then she made her way over to the table, balancing three plates rather skillfully. Once at the table, she set a plate out in front of each of her children before placing the final plate in front of herself. As soon as she did this, they began to eat in silence. The silence did not last for long.

"Donovan Christopher! You know better than that. Eat with utensils, not your hands."

Sheepishly, the boy looked at her and then grabbed up his fork to eat in a more civilized manner without argument. She gave him a smile to show it was nothing too serious and then it was back to concentrating on devouring their breakfast. It went on this way, the three of them eating quietly, until Eva decided a bit of a conversation would be nice.

"So you two, have any plans for when you get to Natasha's?"

In the typical fashion of a young boy, Donovan shrugged without a pause from his eating. Aly, however, had plenty to say.

"Natasha says we're gonna go for a walk, and then we're gonna play at the park, and then when we get back she said we get to make cookies!"

Eva kept herself from shaking her head at the list of activities, instead opting to grin openly. "Is that all?"

This time Aly did shrug, looking disappointed that she was unable to answer. "I don't know."

"Relax, Al, I was just saying that sounds like a lot. It sounds like plenty of fun."

The little girl nodded vigorously and Eva turned to regard the other little one sitting at the table, very content with eating at the moment.

"What about you, D? Do you think that sounds like a lot of fun?"

Donovan swallowed what was in his mouth and brought a pair of big, round eyes up to meet her gaze. "I like cookies. They're yummy."

Then he was back eating in the next second and Eva couldn't help it, she let out a small laugh, finally returning to her own food. She missed the days when such simple pleasures were enough to keep her content and happy. It was probably why her aunt tried so hard to make sure the kids had a good time whenever they were over. That way they wouldn't go away, like Eva had done. She liked to think she would have stayed with Natasha, had things been different. But her father had been her father, who had been Wesker, and that had made all the difference. It must have made all the difference for Chris's fate as well. She couldn't think of any other reason someone could have been so determined to take the former BSAA agent out of the picture. It always seemed to amount to being in some way, whether directly or indirectly, Wesker's fault. Chris...

/

_The sky was clear, hardly a cloud in the sky that day. It seemed funny to Eva at the time. She would have thought it would be raining on such an occasion. That's how it always seemed to go in the movies. Rain, when the primary character in the story being told was saddest, usually because there had been a loss of some kind. And there had certainly been a loss for Eva. Six full months after Chris's disappearance, the police finally had had enough of her persistence to keep the case open as a missing person's case. Their argument was that there existed ample evidence of death, evidence that had been found mere days after Chris first went missing._

_The police would be right, too. An excess of blood had been found at the warehouse police believed the former BSAA agent had not been taken to by force. They believed it was the place where he died as the amount of blood found at the scene was too much to hope for a man to have survived. Wesker had called her, because of course he had somehow learned detailed information about the police investigation, and even he informed her that her hope was false. He explained to her that even someone as special as Chris was, with a form of the R-Virus inside him, could not hope to survive the loss of so much blood._

_She ignored him, ignored anyone who dared tell her the search for Chris was pointless, and for six months she did everything in her power to try and find him. After those six months expired, the detective in charge of the case told her he could hold off no longer, and declared the case closed. So by all rights and purposes, Chris Redfield was declared officially dead for the second time in his life. The death was made much more concrete though as the word got around, and a proper funeral was held now that law enforcement was certain of the fatality this time. And the day of the funeral had been a beautiful day._

_Chris had spent the majority of his life too busy for much socializing, choosing to spend most of his time working on one kind of mission or another. Yet there had been a fair portion of attendees at the ceremony held at the burial site. Eva hadn't realized, and she'd wondered at the time if Chris had ever even known himself, that he had touched so many lives during the span of his lifetime. She knew most of Chris's history, so she was not surprised when she arrived at the funeral, to see he was to be honored for his service in the military. He served in the Air Force for a time before retiring at a young age, deciding he just wasn't on the same page as his superiors that he worked under, and Raccoon City S.T.A.R.S. then loomed soon after in the horizon for him._

_Though it was an unspecified discharge from the Air Force, it appeared the military was more than happy to approve the deceased man's sister's request for a burial with honors. After all, Chris Redfield might not have felt he was built for the military life, but he had decided to dedicate the better part of his life to working for the government. Not only that, but he had served his country in such a way that he received commendations and recognition of distinguished service for the United States. In other words, Chris had made a difference in the world, and they were willing to acknowledge that with at least a proper burial ceremony._

_Even though Eva had been the one to spend the most time with Chris in the last weeks of his life, somehow she felt like she would have been intruding on the funeral, had she sat beside Claire, who was of course seated front row. So instead she chose to remain in the background, there throughout it all, but there as a silent member of the crowd come to mourn. It was easier to observe everything that way as well._

_Most present in the cemetery she did not recognize. That in itself wasn't so strange considering Eva had known the deceased man for only months, not years like she assumed many of the people there had. She did know a few of them though, from pictures Chris had shown her, and memories he had shared. One such as Barry Burton for instance. Barry had served in the same unit as Chris in the Air Force, as well as being on the same team in S.T.A.R.S. In fact, Chris once told her Barry was the one to introduce him to her father, Albert Wesker, and she wasn't entirely certain Chris ever truly forgave the older man for doing so. It wasn't like Barry knew at the time how much of a traitorous bastard Wesker would actually turn out to be._

_So there had been Barry Burton present with his wife Kathy and their girls, seated in the same row as Claire and Leon. A sizable quantity of BSAA members had shown up for the funeral and another old face from the past had become recognizable to her almost as quickly as Barry had. A woman somewhere in her thirties, a fellow survivor of that horrendous incident in the mansion outside Raccoon City in 1998. Her name was Rebecca Chambers and she and Chris had helped one another survive that nightmare of a night filled with monsters of numerous kinds. There were three other familiar faces, two men and a young blonde haired woman, seated amongst the people in attendance._

_The six active U.S. Air Force members carrying the casket from the hearse over to the grave had drawn her gaze then, becoming the only thing she focused on. Never having found a body, the casket was purely ceremonial, for the sake of having something to bury in his name. Inside were a few personal effects selected by his sister, Claire, though Eva had never bothered to ask what exactly had been put in there. It didn't really seem all that important to her. In the end, Chris would still be dead and she would still be broken._

_She never noticed the man lurking at the back of the gathered crowd, not even that far from her own position, leaning against a tree. The man wearing a long black leather coat and dark sunglasses. Wesker, come to mourn a deceased man, once ally and once enemy to him intermittently throughout the years. Eva never took any notice of a woman in a red dress either, the dress mostly hidden by a tan trench coat likely used for the very purpose of obscuring the dress from obvious sight. She didn't directly join the mourners, choosing instead to remain farther apart from them. This woman did notice Wesker, and he noticed her, but neither acknowledged the other and they both probably preferred it that way._

_It was when the soldiers were folding the American flag that had once been spread across the casket, preparing it to be presented to the next of kin, his sister, when Eva finally gave in. She wept openly and bitterly. She liked to think it was because she was well over six months pregnant, a fact concealed by a bulky sweatshirt, that she was so emotionally unstable and incapable of maintaining her general emotionless facade. She would like to think that, but she knew better. It was immense grief she was enduring pure and simple. The man she loved taken from her without warning, without any foreseeable or explainable reason. And it was just unfair._

/

A particularly powerful rack of coughing brought Eva right from her thoughts as she fought to get her breath returned. She wiped her nose out of reflex and cursed when the side of her hand came back wet with blood. Both of her children were staring wide-eyed at her and she scolded herself in her head for swearing in front of them. Eva excused herself from the table quickly, telling them to finish their breakfast and get their coats on. There was no need for them to see her acting..unmotherly.

A mother was perfect in the eyes of a child and she didn't want their naive, and therefore innocent lives to be disrupted by anything whatsoever. It was why she had completely left her old life behind. No more weapons, no more fighting, no more going looking for trouble, or her father. Trouble and her father tended to go hand in hand so it only made her life easier that she'd decided to put Wesker in the past along with the rest of the life she used to have.

She splashed water on her face over the bathroom sink and grabbed up a washcloth to dry her face, ridding it of the obnoxious blood as well. Fortunate for her, the nosebleed was slight and she managed to clean herself up within a couple of minutes. Drying her hands, she switched off the bathroom light and returned to the kitchen to find Donovan ready to go while Aly remained seated at the table. The child was finished eating, her dish already properly rinsed and in the sink, but she had made no move to put her coat on.

After grabbing hold of her own coat and satchel, she came over to her daughter. "Aly Jane, what's the problem? We have to go."

Still Aly did not move. Eva switched tactics and shifted the tone in her voice from stern to concerned.

"Al, Natasha is waiting."

"Are you going to go away?"

"Excuse me?"

"Are you going to go away like Daddy?"

Instantly she was at her daughter's side. "No, of course not. Why would you even think that?"

Continuing to look straight ahead of herself, the five-year-old shrugged her little shoulders and stood up to put her coat on. Eva stopped her briefly, placing a hand lightly atop her head.

"Hey, Aly, I'm not going anywhere, okay? I'm going to stay right here with you guys."

Aly met her eyes then and what she said next shocked her to the core. "You say that now but..."

"But what? What is it? What's bothering you?"

"Things are going to change. You don't know it yet but they are."

"Nothing's changing, what are you talking about?"

"We should go." Aly said instead. "We don't want to keep Natasha waiting."

Eva stared after her daughter as she shrugged her coat on and went to stand by her brother at the front door. The siblings exchanged glances with one another before turning their attention on the door, as if waiting for it to open for them. Eva couldn't make heads or tails about what Aly meant and again she got that feeling of puzzlement whenever either one of her kids acted far beyond their years. Those two were far more intuitive than the average person, more intuitive than Eva herself, a woman at genius level intelligence. Then again, her children weren't fully human so all bets were off.

She ushered the two of them out the door and let her eyes linger on the closet directly across from the front door that double-locked with a deadbolt. Inside the closet was a 12-gauge shotgun hidden at the back of the top shelf along with extra ammunition. If anyone were to look in the locked bedside drawer, there was a .45 handgun with an extra clip, the key holding permanent residence inside the pillowcase of the pillow she slept on. Under the driver's seat of her black, four-door Sedan was a magnum and a 9mm. Her children were all she had any more and she wasn't going to risk losing them if anyone were to find out they weren't entirely human. No way in hell would Eva ever let anything bad happen to them. She protected her own.


	3. The Recruits

_Nine Years Earlier_

_Atlanta, Georgia_

Exactly twenty-two prisoners currently inhabited the first floor of Cell Block B in the United States Penitentiary. This particular prison was medium security, primarily used for transfers, with male prisoners once delivered there occupying isolated cells until pick-up. The isolation cells were full up at the moment, however, leaving several transfer prisoners to be living temporarily among the general population. These prisoners were being housed in Block B. When the time came for prisoner check before heading to the mess hall, a twenty-third prisoner was present for count without notice from prisoners and guards alike.

This prisoner who did not belong, wore the same solid blue shirt and pants that every other inmate wore. The pants were baggy and the shirt was loose, even on one as muscular in the upper body as he certainly was. A gray-uniformed guard moved along the row of standing inmates, glancing from a clipboard to their faces, appearing as though he thought the whole task to be rather mundane. Everything was calm, business as usual, until the guard reached the end of his first line and to the man who didn't belong in this room. Bored gaze peered from clipboard to face, clipboard to face, and then the bored look was exchanged for a confused and suspicious one.

"Who are you?" he demanded of the unidentified man. "Name."

"A man with a schedule to keep, so you'll have to forgive me if I don't stay to chat," the man told him earnestly, before proceeding to sock him full force in the center of his face.

The guard dropped like a stone and as soon as he hit the floor, the place erupted into chaos. It was the diversion the intruder had intended and he pushed his way through the mess of prisoners and now guards too, trying to make it over to a particular prisoner. This prisoner he searched to gain sight of was tall and well-built, his blue shirt wrapped around his waist in favor of sporting the simple white tank top instead, and he was standing off to the side in order to keep out of the way of the fighting. A long tribal tattoo extended down his right arm and it was that distinguishing mark which told the starter of a prison riot that he had his man.

"Billy Coen, right?"

Dark eyes searched the man who had called upon him. "Am I supposed to know who you are?"

"Probably not. We only met once, a long time ago. You were running."

"Buddy, I've been running my whole life. Who are you and what do you want from me? Not that you care, but I'm an innocent man waiting to die, and I'd like to do it in peace."

"Right, sorry about that. My name is Chris Redfield. I'm the one here to get you out."

"And why would you do that?" questioned Billy.

"As you said, you're an innocent man."

"And the real reason?"

Chris smiled at the man's no bullshit kind of attitude. He was liking this guy already.

"We're putting a team together. There's a threat on the rise, of the biological weapon kind. We believe a man named Darius Greene is leading this group building weapons and I understand you've had some experience with this sort of thing."

Billy Coen shook his head. "That was a long time ago."

"Yes, we know." Chris told him. "But you managed to elude the authorities for over a decade. That makes you pretty good."

"At running away. Doesn't sound like a useful asset to me."

Chris grinned. "Trust me, it's useful. You fight for us, and I can promise you we're not going to let the government get its hands on you. In fact, we're going to fake your death. At least until it's safe enough for us to bring you forward and get your record cleared."

"Another tried to do that for me once, faking my death. She was trying to give me a chance to get away. It didn't work out so well as you can see." Billy indicated his point by tugging at the issued tank top part of his prison uniform.

A guard came charging in the direction of the two, apparently deciding that their mere standing in one place and talking was a threatening gesture. With a sigh, Chris refrained from responding to Billy in favor of spinning and landing a well-aimed kick into the guard's chest when he got close enough. The employee flew several feet, getting far too cruelly treated by a couple of prisoners who thought it would be fun to start kicking at the fallen man. Chris put an end to that when he walked over and put them both down, one with a kick to the chest like the guard, and the other with a nose breaking punch to the face.

Returning to Billy, Chris ran a hand through his short hair. "Rebecca, I know. We can get the job done and make it official, believe me. Now if you're coming, let's go before back-up arrives."

"Look, who is we? You seem like a soldier but you're talking like a government agent. I don't exactly trust the government after what they did to me."

"I don't work for the government, not any more. I don't have time to give you my whole life's history so either you're in or out. Oh, and if it helps, Rebecca Chambers is in."

"Rebecca..." Billy murmured, more to himself, before raising the volume of his voice to say something to Chris. "You know Rebecca?"

"Yeah, I do."

Billy glanced down at his attire, the chaos of the prison cell around him, and then back to Chris. "Alright let's do this."

Chris smiled and nodded, extending out his hand. "Glad to have you with us."

After a quick handshake, Chris led the way, jogging to the other side of the cell area where the fighting was least prominent. A guard was there with an assault rifle, appearing to be blocking the exit from any prisoners who might dare to try and escape during the riot. Chris knew the guard in particular was there for a different reason. A quick look at one another and then the guard was handing a gun to him and in return he pressed a rather thick wad of bills into the gloved hand. Billy was looking pretty bewildered by the act but Chris only gave him a grin and a wave for him to follow.

Chaos was everywhere, even outside. There were helicopter blades whirring up above. The pair of men turned their sights skyward to find the chopper approaching. Shockingly to the retrieved inmate, it was not a marked police aircraft. Chris was not so surprised. He'd been expecting it. When the aircraft reached the two, it touched down smoothly and a young woman hopped out. She was maybe twenty-four or twenty-five, with brown hair pulled back in a messy bun and blue eyes. The scope rifle she had slung over one shoulder only added to her attractiveness.

"Waiting for an invitation, Chris?"

The man addressed, smiled at her, then looked towards Billy. "Leena, this is Billy Coen, our newest member. Billy, this is Leena Goessing, former military and a hell of a shot."

Chris approached the helicopter. "And the pilot for tonight, Keith Rennigan. He prefers to go by Renny. He's a decent shot so we like to keep him around."

"Hey! I heard that. Not nice, man. Now let's go! Police are coming to lock this place down."

Billy watched as the young woman boarded the chopper, Chris following close behind. The male turned back, peeking over his shoulder towards the freed prisoner.

"You coming, Coen?"

"It's Billy. Yeah I am."

He wondered if Rebecca had thought of him at all during the years since that nightmarish day in 1998. He'd thought of her plenty. On second thought, he knew she had thought of him at some point. After going through a nightmare like that together, there wasn't any doubt.

 

_One week later_

_Southern Europe- exact location unknown_

 

Rumors of biological catastrophes have been greatly underestimated. The rising death toll, the countless small towns and villages lost to man-made plagues, continue to be undervalued at every turn. Men like Albert Wesker get away with doing things like infecting remote places because there isn't much proof and there isn't much care. At least, nobody cared until America was directly affected by it.

America had been hit before, in 1998. The Raccoon City disaster saw the loss of over 100,00 American lives because of a T-Virus outbreak that spread across the city, turning citizens into the living dead. As time went by, ordinary everyday people began to forget. The U.S. government continued the campaign against Umbrella Corporation by legal means and by the year 2004, the company was supposedly finished. In secret, Umbrella continued to exist and flourish, creating seemingly upstanding and legit organizations such as the B.S.A.A. (Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance), and Murphy Pharmaceuticals.

It was the hard work and sacrifice of a few who saved the world when a threat arose in Kijuju, Africa, 2009. It was the same determination and bloodshed of those few who saved the world again in Aurora, Colorado, that same year. The public didn't really understand what went on with those two separate incidents, and the government was busy trying to continue the cover-up of the very real threat biological warfare presented to the world. Nobody remembered Raccoon City any more. Everyone had forgotten. Then Belfort, France was wiped off the map. Suddenly everybody cared.

Chris had always cared and he'd been in the mud and the rain, risking it all to try and bring a very real peace of mind to the American people, heck, to the world's mind. If biological weaponry began elsewhere in the world, how long would it take to reach the U.S? He didn't think it would take long at all and he wasn't willing to wait around to find out. So when the latest organization he'd devoted himself to turned out to be a fraud, run by the very people he had sworn vengeance against, he walked away from the B.S.A.A. and decided to find his own allies in the fight against bio-terrorism.

Now, after several months had passed since the Aurora mission, his own hand-picked team was nearly complete. There was one more recruit to find and offer a position on his team. He'd had enough of trusting Wesker's kind of people and so this time around, when Wesker claimed to desire to stop bioterrorist threats along with him, he'd informed the guy that he'd be doing the choosing for their next renegade band of misfits according to society. So now here they were, in some place he didn't know the name of, nearby a place he only knew the name of, Edonia.

Five members of Chris's newly founded vigilante anti-bioterrorism force, entered the foreign nation with him. Seven members would leave with him to another country to begin the battle against the threat Darius Greene posed. Albert Wesker was immediately drawn in to his decision to seek the recruitment of this latest subject of interest. He was aware Chris was familiar with the girl's name because of Claire Redfield's association with her since the Raccoon City incident. In fact, it was Claire's association with the girl that had led Chris to her. There was no other familiarity there though. Chris could see all of this and yet the man never asked why he'd selected her to join their team. It made him smile a little, seeing Wesker forcing himself to exercise restraint in questioning his current motives.

Maybe Wesker was growing somewhat after all, if he was allowing Chris to choose someone from his past to join. Or maybe the guy was just glad Chris was separated from his daughter. That last thought rubbed him the wrong way a bit, but hey, Eva had made the decision of her own free will. She wanted a real life. Safe from the constant perils a life on the run, an endless fight against bioterrorism, and being the daughter of an infamous man got her if she remained in that line of work. He couldn't blame her for leaving. But it didn't make him miss her any less.

"Chris, we're nearly there." Renny called back to the team leader.

When Chris did the recruiting, it was kind of assumed by the people he asked to join his team that he was running things. He did try to correct it by admitting no single person was calling the shots at any given time, but a couple of them flat out told him they wouldn't be following anything Wesker tried to order them to do. Apparently they didn't trust the guy. Chris could relate. Though his lack of trust came from personal experience rather than simply being weirded out by the man's persistent habits of wearing sunglasses and failing to smile. Then the name of the team somehow came about shortly after it was unanimously decided he was to be leader. Red. Red team, or Team Red. As in, Chris Redfield, shorten the last name, to get just Red.

It just got worse from there, because although Leena was absolutely professional where required, she was also obviously holding a torch for him. Weeks went by without him realizing it and then Wesker had made a very inappropriate and very adult comment concerning the issue which left the pair of them red-faced and not speaking to one another for days. Time had continued to pass, a couple missions were completed (locations Wesker was able to recall from a computer in the lab of the Aurora facility infinitely useful), and somehow things went on back to the way they were. The way they were, save for the fact that Chris consciously chose to ignore the crush instead of being completely oblivious to it. Maybe he should have manned up and confronted her about it but he had more important matters weighing on his mind. Like Darius Greene. Darius had to be stopped.

At one point Chris had been sympathetic to Darius's situation. His family had been slaughtered by the Umbrella Corporation, his younger brother kidnapped and experimented on for years. The experimentation had turned the brother bad, inhuman really. The guy had clearly lost it and saw the world as something that needed to be wiped clean, as in complete extermination of every living thing. They'd had no choice but to put him down.

Darius hadn't liked that. Though the truth of the matter was that Greene revealed himself to be greedy just like the Umbrella heads he hated so much. He felt entitled to have everything the company had since they stole his brother from him. So now even with Umbrella permanently gone, there was still another psycho running about out there causing chaos. After they picked up the next member of the group, they would be headed abroad to investigate the destruction of an entire city. The government had decided to bomb it into extinction, exactly like Raccoon. This was probably the first move made by Darius to try and continue experimenting with Umbrella's materials. An accidental outbreak or a test exposure, that was something Chris didn't even care to know. He was over trying to talk to him. The man had beaten him into a bloody mess and would have killed him if the very thankful appearance of Claire, Leon, Eva, Wesker, and Krauser hadn't occurred.

"You ready for this?" he asked Billy Coen, turning to glance to where the muscular man in tan cargo pants, a dark blue t-shirt, and an assault vest was seated.

Billy was checking and rechecking his primary firearm. It was why he had asked. They were pursuing a government agent who had been sent on a mission. This was an unknown situation, shit would probably go to hell like it always did, and he wanted to be sure the other was ready for that kind of action after being cooped up in prison. He'd made the guy show him he still had an eye for shooting and he did, being former military and all. It couldn't hurt to check the preparedness of the latest recruit now that their arrival was fast approaching.

"Why won't you tell me about the mission where you last encountered Darius Greene?"

Well, it wasn't exactly the response he was expecting. He glanced out the helicopter's side window behind where he was seated before looking back towards Billy. He didn't answer. Aurora was a mission where he nearly died, yes. But he had nearly died plenty of times in the past. The suffering, had been memorably high though, as had the loss. Losing Jill, losing Sheva, nearly dying in Africa, that was horrible during that mission. The mission in Aurora, Colorado, however, had been a darker kind of hell. He'd suffered and been approaching death from being literally thrown through time. He witnessed a happy future free from this life of heartache and extreme danger and sacrifice, which included an actual family he'd always wanted. And he turned it down. Once again he pushed aside his own happiness in exchange for continuing the fight to protect the happiness and security of others. Then he lost Eva too.

"It's gonna be dangerous from here on in if everything you've told me is true. So how about we cooperate?"

"A lot of the things I've kept from you, you wouldn't believe."

The escaped prisoner, hoping to be freed from his wrongful conviction after successfully serving in Chris's squad for a time, scoffed at him. "I've seen a lot of things I wouldn't have believed before seeing them. Like a crazy walking leech guy who thought his name was James Marcus."

Wesker had something to say to that, smirking as he did so. "The man was bizarre even in life."

"Oh, I believe it. I heard his little loud speaker announcement that repeated throughout the mansion like some kind of creepy, 'I'm crazy but your boss so watch out' mantra."

Wesker released a low chuckle, continuing to face forward as he said, "Ending him was a breath of fresh air."

Admitting to murder, that was one way to end a conversation instantaneously. Leena and Renny, who knew Wesker the least, exchanged uncomfortable, uncertain glances. Rebecca was looking angry over such a calm and cold-hearted admittance of guilt, while Billy just looked a little put out. So much for a team bonding moment. Or maybe this helicopter ride wasn't a total loss. His fellow former S.T.A.R.S. member and mansion incident survivor had traded in her negative stare to a more concerned one for Billy, moving to sit next to him.

"How are you, Billy?"

"Rebecca, it's good to see you."

"That's not an answer."

"Looks like there's a lot of that going around. Can't get a straight answer out of anyone in this group."

He stared directly at Chris as he said this. Chris rolled his eyes and averted his gaze to his own window, though he continued to listen.

"Billy, you're alive. You survived. That's what's important."

The man cleared his throat. "Yeah, well, it looks like you did a lot better than me. Chris told me you're a hotshot doctor saving lives on a daily basis."

Rebecca giggled. Over a decade gone by since she was an 18-year-old rookie and Chris still couldn't believe how youthful the woman always appeared. It must have something to do with how she carried herself, so light-heartedly and with such ease.

"I wanted a place where I could use my skills for the benefit of mankind. After what happened..that night, really two nights for me... I couldn't see myself using my brain for scientific research purposes any longer. Too many decent scientists either unknowingly created evil or they became evil all for the sake of trying to make people better." Chris turned around to look at her as she shifted, placing a hand over one of Billy's own. "People are who they are. No amount of science can change what's in here."

She moved her free hand to place it over his heart. Billy nodded knowingly in her direction. "Anybody can overcome adversity but if you truly want to test a person's strength, give them power."

The team medic seemed impressed and contemplative over his comment. "Who said that?"

Billy took the hand from his heart and held it for a moment. "Abraham Lincoln."

He shrugged it off the next second when noises from the ground they were flying over became audible. All eyes immediately went to the windows and the area directly below them. They could hear sporadic gunfire and screaming, lots of screaming.

Chris chose the moment to draw their attention in to the mission at hand. "Check your spare ammunition, make sure all weapons are loaded, the safety off. No time for mistakes on a mission like this. There have been reports of people going missing in the area, mysterious deaths. We're going in heavy because we're not taking any chances."

"People gone missing. Yeah, this is exactly the kind of shit I was talking about. Way to keep the team informed, captain."

"I'm not a captain. It's Chris, just Chris."

"Whatever you say, boss."

"I will knock your ass out of this helicopter, Coen."

His sister, Claire, had wanted him to steer clear from Wesker and find another organization to join. One that could provide backup and support, plus legit resources they could use. Chris didn't like the idea because of this sort of thing; people giving him attitude or superiors trying to tell him how he should do his job. He wasn't eager to go through that crap again anytime soon. After what happened with the B.S.A.A. turning out to be a creation of Umbrella's in order to keep tabs on people like him trying to stop illegal biological research and experimentation, his partner, Sheva Alomar, betraying him, he chose a different way. A way where things could actually get done. Chris hated to admit it but a lot more did get done with Wesker along, and it got done faster and with fewer casualties.

"Temper, Chris."

He just wanted to knock Wesker's teeth out and likely, the other man knew full well the emotion he was evoking. Chris ran a hand through his hair, slightly ruffling it, and breathed in then out. His gaze went to the window as the chopper descended outside of the direct area where the trouble was present. People were running terrified down there. He was ready as soon as the helicopter touched down, hopping out. Billy, Rebecca, and Leena followed close behind while Wesker remained inside with the pilot, who was leaning over him to talk out the window.

"You go ahead on foot. I'm gonna circle the joint."

Chris tapped his radio earpiece to signal the pilot talk through his own headset to test it out, responding, "Roger that. Provide cover fire where needed."

The pilot had gotten the best look at what was happening out there and so he gave an affirmative response before preparing to set off into the sky again. Chris led the way at the ground level, Leena not far from him, then Billy, with Rebecca taking up the rear. They headed right into a war zone, or rather, a massacre.


	4. Red Team

_Nine Years Earlier_

_Southern Europe- exact location unknown_

The villagers were running every which way, fear and panic abound. Four pairs of eyes tried to take in as much as possible, as quickly as possible. There was a building being absolutely swarmed by a mob of people dead ahead. To the right, a girl was screaming bloody murder as a woman crouched over her. Chris couldn't figure out why until the blood began to stream from beneath where the young girl was lying. He didn't waste any time running over to shove the woman off with the bottom of his boot.

Leena was right with him. Together they realized in horror that the woman had been feeding on the girl's neck. The woman spat a piece of flesh out, blood dribbling down her chin, and stared at them in what could only be described as a deranged manner. Her eyes were reddened, badly irritated, dark and very visible veins showing on her bare arms, neck, and face. On closer viewing, her arms and legs appeared somewhat contorted and elongated as well, neck hanging awkwardly to the side while she stared.

"What? Is this what a zombie is like?"

He shook his head confusedly. "I..don't know... This looks like the majini I saw in Africa but.." His eyes went from the woman directly in front of them to the immediate area around. "Look at the way they attack, so vicious..almost animalistic."

The two of them watched as the woman slowly turned away again, back to the girl who was now motionless in the dirt with eyes of glass. She leaned over the body, dropping to her knees. Placing her lips to touch the puddle of blood, she began to slurp it up. Chris gaped at the disgusting sight.

"This isn't a zombie. This is something else. Zombies hunger for flesh. There's clearly something wrong with her but it's.."

"Whoah. Ew! Nasty! It's like a vampire." Billy remarked, coming up to stand at Chris's other shoulder with Rebecca.

"My God..."

"Hey Rebecca, remember those giant leeches on the train? Must have wiped those poor suckers out in-"

Rebecca interrupted the reminder of a nightmare long past. "I remember Billy."

She didn't sound like she was too fond of the opportunity to be reminded of that particular portion of her past.

"What's happened to them?" she wondered aloud. "Who could have done this?"

No one answered her because they didn't know. Well, maybe Chris knew.

"I don't know what this is, but it is definitely something Darius Greene could be capable of. Keep your eyes open and help these people. Billy, Rebecca, head to the left and help anyone you can. Leena, you're with me. Make sure your comm. device is on at all times and search for any evidence that this is Greene's handiwork."

"Chris."

He paused to turn back and meet her eyes. "This won't be like last time, like Raccoon. We're all getting out of here."

She gave him a weak smile and then jogged off to catch up with Billy, who was being attacked by some of these strange looking people. So they were violent.

"Chris!"

The tone told him everything he needed to know. Chris didn't even look. He dove and rolled sideways, in time to avoid the long freakin' arm slamming into the ground where he'd stood a moment ago. This guy was even further gone than the others. One arm appeared a tad longer than usual but the other was so overgrown and thick, it dragged behind him as he stalked towards Leena now.

The not-person slathered at her, an overly lengthy tongue hanging out of its mouth. It released a growl and then used the extensive arm to propel itself up from the ground to leap atop her. Leena took a couple steps to the side, avoiding the person who had once been a man, and aimed her weapon at him. She hesitated, staring at the horrifically deformed human.

"What's happened to him?"

"Some kind of mutation. Shoot it!"

"But..could there be a cure?"

The thing came at her again before he could answer and she didn't hesitate to put it down with a brief spray of bullets from her machine gun. She looked shaken but quickly composed herself. A first time in a situation like this, he couldn't blame her. Seeing people reduced to near mindless monsters was never easy. But Chris learned long ago that his survival usually depended on his ability to shoot them dead before they got to him.

"No time to worry about the possibility of a cure," she concluded on her own, speaking out of breath even though she hadn't exerted herself physically.

He could understand that, too. Together, they spread slightly out, clearing the area of the violent people obviously infected with something awful. The infected people were agitated and murderous, latching on to the uninfected to drain them of their blood. Unfortunately, when they'd gotten through the area, everyone was either dead, exhibiting rabid-like behavior, or else had been bitten and fed off of partially. And the ones who had been fed from, had begun to turn themselves, within minutes. A little boy seemingly fine one moment, was found in the next, tearing open his older sister's wrist with his teeth. Teeth that had somehow become sharper almost instantly after the infection had completely taken him over.

Chris put a bullet in him and the rest of the turning survivors himself, Leena beyond unnerved by what she was witnessing to do much on her end. Before moving on, he'd waited until she was ready. It was a shocking scene to suddenly stumble upon. She deserved the time to grasp the present situation. What could be afforded anyway.

About five minutes after he no longer heard the helicopter blades spinning in the air, having moved on no doubt, he knew they had to move.

"Leena, get it together. Do what you've always done. Breathe deep, keep yourself moving, and focus on the mission. We came here to find a potential new member to our cause. And what we did for these people, was put them out of their misery. They weren't who they used to be. None of them. I've had a lot of experience with viruses and infections. Just look at me."

He waved a hand in the general area of his eyes, referencing the green specks in them.

"When you become infected, you're altered. Sometimes the virus is sophisticated enough to leave the infected near human, just..better improved in some areas. For me, I heal wounds within a few hours and I'm more resilient to injury than the average human because I was infected with something called the Regenerative virus, then put through actual time travel which rearranged my cell structure. Wouldn't recommend that by the way. Now, this girl I'm looking to bring to our team, she can heal, too. She can heal better than I can, even faster, a side effect of once being infected with the G-Virus. These people here... I don't know what infected them but it was something that changed them more than either me or the woman we're looking for. They are changed more than Wesker. They have no rational thought. They only thirst for violence and for some strange reason, also for blood. That's made them a threat to others. Do you see?"

"Of course I do. It's just..." Leena sighed and pushed herself to her feet. "I guess."

He accepted it. "All right then. Let's move."

She smiled at him and nodded. "Yes. Come on."

Together the two of them scoured the main roadway they were traveling upon, making their way further into this small village. Every so often they came upon an infected who tried to attack them, but there was no major trouble. It was a welcome change to the usual crap Chris was used to enduring on his missions. He supposed this could be considered a minor one. A mission precluding the true mission to put a stop to Darius Greene and his people.

There was a somber atmosphere to this day though. It was already getting dark. Perhaps they'd left a tad later than was safest, but the information had come when it came and they'd left once they got it.

"Listen." He held up his hand as a signal for his partner to stop behind him.

There was a sound drawing near. His eyes scanned the ground where he noticed slight trembling at the surface. Something big was coming. Something he very much doubted would be friendly. Chris lowered his arm and picked up the pace, jogging to the side and placing his back against one of the buildings. Leena followed his lead and plastered herself beside him just as the source of the noise came into sight.

"What..What is that?" his female counterpart gasped out.

"That's a big ass mother fucker is what it is."

Chris and Leena's firearms came up to aim at the unidentified male voice in a synchronized fashion. There was a young man, probably in his late teens at the most. Somehow his face made him appear older though. He had close shaven hair, a solid jaw, a scar on one cheek, and a hardened face. His clothing included army combat pants, boots, a belt, a black shirt and a black leather jacket. He wore gloves and he was armed. What business he had here was anybody's guess. The guy also gave Chris a feeling of familiarity he couldn't shake. The words came out before he could think about it.

"Do I know you from somewhere?"

"What? Chris do you know this man?" Leena questioned.

The guy was looking at him like he was insane for asking the question. "Nah, you military type all look the same to me."

He reminded Chris an awful lot of the way Eva was: Confident, self-assured, intelligent, and cocky all at once.

"That's who you are, yeah?" Jake continued. "Clearly Americans, and being all the way out here, gotta be."

"Sorry to disappoint." Chris told him.

He took a moment to check out the jacket he was wearing more closely. It could be that it was a type of uniform of a less legitimate organization. Maybe he should be asking him if he was a member of some military group.

A roar shook the ground and the building he and Leena had their backs against, reminding him of the matter at hand. The creature that was stomping through the pathways of a couple of buildings very close to their present location was big, and that was an understatement. It stood maybe fifteen feet high, lanky, but with long trailing arms and legs. The dragging arms had razor sharp fingernails and the head was huge, lolling, skin dark and almost black. The eyes were practically bugging out of its large head, mouth wide and brimming with lines of sharp teeth. The mouth was creepy, lips forming an almost upturned "O" shape, lined with the pointy rows of incisors.

 _All the better for drinking human blood._ He shuddered at the thought.

Surprisingly, the much younger man started the introductions. "Name's Jake Muller. And you are?"

"Chris Redfield. This is Leena Goessing."

"Well, Chris, Leena, I've been hired to get rid of this freak, so whatd'ya say you help me out while you're here?"

He didn't wait to see if they followed. The kid was reckless. He went running for the big creature before Chris even knew it was happening. The former agent took a breath and then raced after the guy to try and prevent his getting himself killed.

Chris heard his partner trailing behind. She stopped short and then released a burst of gunfire from her machine gun. It seemed she didn't want to get too close to the monstrosity towering over them with that insanely creepy, permanent razor-tooth smile. Perhaps his partner had the right idea. He found himself dodging swipes from the tree trunk sized limbs. The thing could move them amazingly fast for his large size.

Finding his moment, he ducked under the creature, raising his weapon above him and firing as he moved below it.

The monster howled with pained rage and lashed out with a giant clawed foot. He managed to avoid it by diving over and behind a stack of cut wood. Then Jake was on it, unloading an entire clip of his handgun into the creature's face.

It served as a distraction, but that was about it. Chris took advantage, using the opportunity to fire at the back of the large head and neck. Leena followed his example, shooting at the actual face of the probably once human thing attacking them.

Continuous bullets pelting its face and head really seemed to be pissing it off. Chris shifted around to the front of the creature and took aim. Two perfect shots managed to blind it in both eyes. The move had placed him directly in front of the monster and unfortunately, it left him vulnerable and in the path of its literal blind rage.

He jumped backwards to avoid one deadly trunk-sized appendage and never saw the other coming until it slammed into him full force. Bones in his body broke upon impact and the pain was instant and intense. His back smashed onto the roof of a building and he rolled roughly down and off, to the ground. The last thing he recalled was a woman screaming his name. It had to be Leena. Everything went dark.

/

When he woke, it was dark. But a different kind of dark. Night had fallen. He sat up and then stood, remembering what had happened to him but fully aware he was healed. He checked himself over and was impressed. There was no sign of any damage to his body that had felt completely useless and broken right before he'd lost consciousness.

"Thank God you're okay."

He turned around to find three sets of eyes on him. His partner had been the one to speak and even though she'd known he could heal, she must have doubted it just the same. It was a pretty crazy thing to even be told, and to see it happen was another thing entirely. The other two present were looking awfully surprised and in awe. She must not have told them what he could do.

The guy, Jake Muller, walked up to him and grabbed his arm, then pressed a hand to his ribs. Okay... Intrusive much. He put a hand on the young man's shoulder and pushed him gently away.

"Impossible. Your ribs were shattered, your arms and legs broken and bent all out of shape." He glanced over his shoulder at the third person in the room. "Do you think he's like you?"

Room. He was in a sparse room where he'd been lying on a table until he'd woken. Possibly he was in the very building he was thrown into. Chris glanced around Jake to his partner and the other individual in the room.

"Well, I don't know. I heal instantaneously while it took him nearly twelve hours to recover from the severe damage his body endured."

"Sherry." He smiled with relief. Then comprehended her words. "Twelve hours!"

His hand went to the ear where his earpiece was and found it absent. He must have lost it when he was thrown onto the roof of a building, then dropped to the ground. Leena didn't have a comm. device of her own which meant he'd lost touch with his people and had no idea where they were. On the bright side, he had found Sherry Birkin.

She looked rightly suspicious. "You know me?"

So Jake and Leena hadn't introduced him. Just what had those twelve hours been like while they held vigil over his motionless and broken body? Must have involved primarily silence and a whole lot of awkward. He wasn't too bothered he'd missed it.

"My name is Chris Redfield. I've come with an offer for you."

"Your partner's already filled me in on your group and what you're trying to do. But Chris Redfield? As in Claire Redfield? You're Claire's brother?"

He nodded in confirmation. "Yeah. She's the reason I decided to come looking for you to join really. She told me about your special condition and how you were growing up, adopting a similar attitude to her, or so she tells me."

The young woman laughed a little. "Yeah, it's true. Claire's kind of always been my great big hero, you know? Saving my life and risking hers to get me out of that city when I was a kid. Spending all that time with me when I was..you know..having tests done for all those years."

He returned a smile to her. "Yeah, she has a soft spot for you big time."

Sherry came closer and for a moment she appeared almost shy about what she said next. "You know, you're her hero. She looks up to you and tries to be like you so I suppose in a way, you are my hero too."

"Wha-I don't know about that," he stammered in surprise.

He'd never expected to hear that from Sherry Birkin, a woman he'd never even met.

"I know," she insisted.

Chris remained stunned but another thought occurred to him. "Wait, that creature out there. Where did it go? What happened after I blacked out?"

Jake shrugged his shoulders, walked over to the door of the place, and pushed it open. The dark of the night was gradually beginning to lift as the day approached.

"See for yourself."

Chris did go out to see and found himself staring at a puddle of black goo not far from the entrance.

"Is that what I think it is?"

"Yup. Whole thing up and mostly evaporated into thin air after the three of us managed to take it down. It was actually kind of like it was melting away. Gross stuff. Sherry here swooped in to the rescue. The rest of it splattered into what you see there after. Freaky, but it's just like those other messed up people once you kill them."

"Okay, well we need to locate our people. I have no idea how many more of them could be out there. Leena-"

"Relax, Chris. I found your comm. device and it was still intact. I told them we'd found the target, mission accomplished. Renny said Wesker and the others were working on some clean-up and then they'd be around to extract us. They probably just ran into a bit more than they were expecting. I'm sure they're fine."

She truly seemed to believe what she was saying, which comforted Chris somewhat. As if on cue, the sound of rotating blades cutting rapidly through air reached his ears. The noise was coming closer and he visibly relaxed this time. If only missions always would work out so smoothly.

Chris returned his attention to Sherry. "I understand you work for a different organization and that they only recently let you out into the world, but I think you should take my offer. I won't experiment on you or run tests, and you know Wesker wouldn't let anyone lay a hand on you."

"Wesker?" Jake asked.

"Yeah." Chris looked at him curiously. "Why?"

The other didn't say anything and then Sherry was speaking to him. "Well, Simmons is alright. He tries to do what he can to protect this country like I do. Oh trust me, I'd love to work alongside someone like you though. Someone who I trust to never try and use me... I'll join on a conditional basis."

Chris and Leena looked at one another, then at the young woman, Chris asking what they were both wondering.

"What conditional basis would that be?"

"I'll join as long as Jake can join too. He's a good fighter. Strong and fast because he's been a mercenary since 15. He's special sort of like me. Jake took an injection that turned his fellow mercenary buddies into those things you saw out there while he remained fine. We could use him on our team."

"Well, sheesh, let's just go tell everyone my dirty little secret."

He frowned at Jake. "What was he infected with?"

"No idea. You ever find out, clue me in," the young man told him. "Some bitch said it'd give us more energy. Imagine my surprise when my buds became murderous and came after me, red eyes and all."

Chris sighed tiredly. Great. Some new virus unleashed on the black market. That was the last thing they needed. He wondered if this was Darius's work.

"Yeah? Well imagine their surprise."

He and Jake stared at one another for a long moment. Sherry smiled at them both. "So we're a part of your team?"

"Sure. From here on out you're both part of the team."

The helicopter was landing further down the street from the building they were occupying. Leena seemed all too happy to see it and started for the aircraft with the other three following after her. When they made it to the helicopter, Wesker wasn't there. When Chris asked, all Renny could tell them was that he'd gotten a call about two hours earlier and said he had to go. He would meet them at the airport when they headed to France on the private jet Renny had landed them through a connection of his.

Chris wasn't surprised. He knew Wesker couldn't be trusted. Still, knowing that didn't really upset him any less about the perpetual lying and sneaking off to attend to "private affairs". He kept hoping, against all odds, that Wesker would change, for Eva's sake. Even Eva must have given up on him though, because as far as he knew, she'd cut off all ties with anyone from this life that meant danger and unhappiness for her. That definitely included Wesker. Unfortunately, that included him, too.

Before turning to get on the chopper, he took one last lingering look at the sunrise breaking out across the sky. He liked sunrises because to him it felt like time was giving him another chance. It was about to be a new day and with a new day, there was always the hope that things could get better. And there was nothing wrong with a little hope.


	5. A Typical Day in the Life

_Present Day_

_Sterling, Colorado_

Generally buildings passed by in a blur for her, but there was something that caught her eye and drew her to it. One of the buildings had a large poster pasted against an entire side of the building and it was of a beautiful sunrise over a nature landscape. 'Don't Let the Sun Rise Over Your Big Savings! Stop in Now, Before Sales End!' The words weren't what held her attention. It was the sunrise. She absolutely loved sunrises. Seeing the sun rise up, sky gradually brightening into day the higher the orb of light got was..well there was nothing like it. To Eva, it felt like a sunrise was telling her it was another day, another chance.

The blaring of a car horn pulled her out of her revery and she jerked the wheel to return to her proper lane. Becoming too absorbed in something else really wasn't a good idea when driving a motorized vehicle. Returning her focus back to the road, she made her way to work, cranking up the radio to make the drive go more quickly.

Arriving, she located her parking spot with the nameplate and all, and parked. The sign read, 'Eva Jane', as though Jane were her last name. She liked it that way. Using her middle name as her last gave her some anonymity, in case anyone ever came prowling around to harm either her or her children. Then it was just a matter of falsifying some government documents and her family was set. After double checking the gun remained easily accessible beneath the driver's seat, the habit one she hadn't been able to break, she grabbed her bag and locked the car before heading into the building. Once inside the glass doors, she waved at the older woman behind the desk and gave a kind smile.

"Hi Janice. How's the new boyfriend?"

"Are you kidding? He's what's keeping me sane in these trying times."

"Oh have a little faith. There are always people out there trying to make things better."

Her eyes shifted to a photograph on the desk. A framed photo that Eva knew contained the picture of her late husband. The man in the picture was young, 25 maybe, while Janice Johnson was an older woman in her 60's. Her husband had died young, killed in combat, fighting to protect his country. The soldier had been her soldier, the love of her life. When he died, even with her heart broken into pieces, she'd never been more proud.

Since his death, Janice Johnson had gone through a series of boyfriends, so much so that she had lost count on the precise number a long time ago. She never slept with any of them and she never promised marriage to any either. Janice had already met her soulmate and for her, there was no one else who could compare. The woman was one of the strongest people Eva had ever met. She had loved and lost and was okay with it as much as she could be.

The boyfriends, Eva figured, were her attempts to deal with loneliness. Though Eva never liked to get into any details about Chris, she'd been willing to share that she too, had had someone whom she deeply loved. Someone who was a soldier who never stopped working to keep the United States free from the fear of viral infection and other terrorist attacks. A man who had married her in secret, gifting her with a precious necklace in place of a wedding ring. A man who had been killed for believing in a future without fear.

"Sweetie? Did you hear what I asked?"

"What? Oh, sorry. Did you say something?"

"You are always zoning out. A sign of a troubled mind. You know, right before I received the news about my husband, my mind was like that. I was always spacey, mind going elsewhere, and all the while I felt there was something off, something not quite right. Then three days later, a military vehicle pulled up to my house and I knew. I realized I had already known."

"Janice, I'm running late so I'd better get inside."

The receptionist glanced at the clock on the wall. Eva still had five minutes before she needed to clock in.

"Go on then, dear. I wouldn't want you to be late."

She gave Janice the most sincere smile she could muster, knowing the woman could see she didn't feel like making small chit chat any longer today. "It's just one of the darker days. I'm sorry, Janice. I'll talk to you later."

"Okay, I'll be speaking with you later then."

Eva walked around the side of the reception desk. Janice shifted in her seat to buzz her in and then she was walking through sliding doors to the security office. She flashed her ID badge, a requirement that was wholly unnecessary considering they saw her walk through those doors on a daily basis. The job as researcher meant long hours and even more devotion. The search for cures against terrible viruses was her way of fighting. This was her method of working to protect her country, and at the same time, it allowed her to keep a little piece of Chris Redfield. It allowed her to keep her mother's memory with her too.

Her mother, Jane Wesker, who was a researcher for Umbrella until she transferred out to get away from what she knew was a bad company of people. A researcher who had wanted to help others. Who had never imagined just how far the corporation she'd worked for would go to test their products and keep people silenced about their illegal activities. She would never really remember her mother, the woman having been murdered when Eva was only a baby, but the picture her father gave her was enough. Eva would hold onto the knowledge she did have about the woman who gave birth to her. The knowledge was all that was left.

"Good morning, Eva."

She smiled and waved in greeting to her friend and co-worker, Joshua Enson. Josh was cute and incredibly charming when he wanted to be. She had even contemplated the idea of them becoming something together because he obviously liked her. Ultimately... Maybe in another life. Eva got the feeling she would end up like Janice Johnson, forever lonely and missing a part of herself.

"Morning, Josh. How goes the efforts to, you know, save the world?"

He grinned at her. "Oh, you know, I do what I can."

After that, the two of them separated and got to work. There would be time for menial chatter at their lunch break. The morning always began the same. Paperwork such as writing reports and reviewing memos for the first hour and a half, then the next three hours were spent on the really mind stretching and grinding tasks of the trial and error that encompassed experimentation and study. To create cures for deadly substances, the substances themselves were required to be present in the lab. Eva didn't like being near any viruses, especially now that she was free of hers. But with what they were trying to do, it was worth the obvious risk it posed, and it was certainly worth her having to be a little uncomfortable.

Finally, lunch rolled around and as she was peering through a microscope. She heard Josh approach from behind. He leaned in to peer over her shoulder.

"Working on anything life-threatening?"

He nudged her shoulder and she gave up on what she was attempting to examine for the time being. She turned to face him, pushing him back from her to get some space between them.

"If I was working on something life-threatening, I'd be in the containment area and you know this."

"Sheesh, only joking, Eva. What's got you bothered today? Little Aly and Donovan giving you more stress than you can handle? Is incredibly tough single motherhood and a full-time job too much work for you? Cause, you know, that sounds like an easy time to me."

Eva fought a smirk and pushed him again. "You wouldn't last a day."

Josh shrugged. "When you're right, you're right. Two is always better than one in these situations."

"Hey, you're welcome to babysit anytime."

His smile slipped a little bit and he became much more serious. "That's not what I meant."

Eva chose to ignore the comment and removed her gloves, disposing them in the container by the door.

"Come on, Josh. Let's go grab some food. I'm starving."

Lunch was always at the same locale, an Italian joint across the street. The place had a variety of pastas and delightfully tasty breadsticks. But the reason the restaurant was very dear to her heart? The joint's pizza was..heavenly. The crust wasn't too thick, not too thin, and fluffy to boot. There was never too much sauce per slice and there was always plenty of gooey, greasy cheese. It might not have been the healthiest meal to eat nearly every single day, but oh well, she had never claimed to be a health nut.

Not a word was spoken between them until they were seated at a table with stools. They'd ordered right away and now awaited the food together. Eva liked to think of this period as a cleansing one, a way for her to excuse the fattening meal she was soon to indulge in. When the order was made, it was a signal things could resume. Hey, she took delicious food seriously.

"So Eva, how have you been lately?"

She mimicked his voice. "So Josh, I've been fine, and you?"

"I'm good, Eva. But don't joke. I'm really asking. You've been..more distant of late."

"Yeah," she breathed, avoiding any actual answer.

Josh was looking at her like he'd really like to tell her how he felt, and what exactly was wrong with such a non-response, but she knew he wouldn't. That was the kind of man he was. A 32-year-old virologist whose superior intelligence and book knowledge combined with Eva's extremely high level of intelligence and personal experience with viruses, made them an excellent duo at working towards potential cures for these viruses. Some cures already existed but many did not, and so this was the task the two of them had been hired to research and hopefully one day solve.

He'd lost a sister to a viral outbreak at an airport in 2005. She recalled the year easily enough because Claire had been at that airport during the incident and told her the whole story of her fight for survival in the place. Losing a sister meant he held a personal stake in this as much as Eva did. Not that she'd told him too much of her own personal history. On the flip-side, he was more than happy to share his life story with her.

Joshua Enson was born in 1986 and spent the majority of his childhood dreaming of being a cowboy. When he reached middle school, he realized it wasn't too realistic of a dream, and his parents and teachers realized how much potential he held when they began to notice his natural genius. A couple of weeks into the sixth grade and he was transferred to a school for gifted children. He took tenth grade level courses. A year later and he was on to twelfth grade level subjects. Six years later and he'd graduated with a double major in biology and mathematics. Another two years and he received his PhD in virology. He was 21 years old. His older sister having died in the time it took him to graduate college, he pursued his studies into viruses at graduate school, so that one day he'd be able to look into the T-Virus that claimed his sister's life.

He was brilliant, handsome, and had the same end goal as she did. Prevent viruses from claiming innocent lives by creating cures for them. He could be head-strong and arrogant at times, but his heart was always in the right place. There were four other siblings in his family and he took time out of his busy work schedule to pay them a visit whenever he could. Two of them, brothers, were still in high school, and the other two, both older, were a lawyer and college professor. The lawyer was a sister and the college professor was another brother.

They'd all felt a whole lot of pain when they lost one of their own at that airport. The whole family got together at least once a year in order to appreciate one another, and Eva, admittedly, was a bit jealous of such a close-knit family so different from her own. Josh was a good man who deserved a loving family and so she was truly happy for him at the same time. They'd become good friends over the years and at least she had that friendship going for herself.

The reason seemed to dawn on him for her refusal to be honest and open with him. "It's that time of year, huh?"

She didn't speak, which was fine, because he appeared more than okay with doing the talking for the both of them.

"Once a year you get like this, distant and anti-social."

She rolled her eyes. "You going to diagnose me, doctor?"

"I'm your friend. I'm trying to help. You spend too much time keeping things to yourself and it's eventually going to come out." He clarified his statement further. "Not in a good way."

"Let's tone down the angst there, Josh."

"Alright, alright. What should we talk about then?"

She didn't answer, instead glancing around the restaurant.

Light shone in through the large picture windows of the building, rays bouncing off of drinking glasses over by the bar area. She took a moment to take in the hustle and bustle on the sidewalk outside. It was just another day in Sterling, Colorado. This was what she had wanted. To be one of the norm and be able to go unnoticed in a regular establishment. And she had kids to boot. Nine years ago the dream had almost felt like a hopeless one. It was all real now. She held a happiness that she never wanted to forget.

"What do you think about the Broncos this year?"

She looked at him. "Football? You're joking."

Josh laughed. "Okay, maybe a little. Books then. Read any good ones lately?"

She grinned. "You know it. I'm actually reading like four different ones right now. The one I think I'd recommend is best, for you, would have to be the one I'm farthest in. It's set in a futuristic society where this kid, fourteen years old, lives in a world where there are very few people left, and this kid has grown up surviving so that world is all he's ever known. He's such an extraordinary person... You would really enjoy it I think."

"I think I might," he said sincerely. "Tell me more."

She smiled and obliged.

After lunch, she finished out the rest of her shift at work and was out the door by six on the dot. She would pick up her children, bring them home, and prepare dinner. This was their daily routine. Routine was something she had grown fond of, after. It kept her occupied, busy, giving her something to plan and focus on. Spontaneity was no longer her thing.

Pulling into her aunt's driveway, she shut off the engine and climbed out. Usually her kids came to meet her at the door but they weren't there this time. She thought about going back to the car to grab the gun under the seat. It took but a second to change her mind. If there was danger, she could take care of it whether she had a gun or not. Six years hadn't made her forget the combat skills her father taught her growing up.

Eva walked through the front door without knocking. She came nearly every day and Natasha would be expecting her. If there was nothing wrong at least. Thankfully her mind had been paranoid for no reason. She found the three of them sitting on the living room floor playing a board game. She smiled fondly at the sight. Natasha loved having a real role in Eva's life again and Eva loved her for it. The four of them were her true family.

"Natasha, how was it?"

"Good. Always good. You know that, hon. And hello to you too."

Laughing a little, she came to stand over by the three.

"I'm glad. We should be going though. I still have to stop by the store before home so I can make dinner."

"Nonsense. You stay here for dinner tonight."

"No, really, I wouldn't impose-"

It was all for naught trying to argue with someone as strong-headed as her aunt.

"I'm already preparing it. You will stay."

"She's making spaghetti!" Donovan exclaimed far too excitedly. The little man enjoyed his food.

She threw up her hands in defeat. "Okay, okay. We'll stay."

Ten minutes later and they were all seated around Natasha's dining room table with steaming plates of sauced noodles in front of them. They ate in silence for a few minutes before Natasha did what she always did. She liked to talk about current events, and unfortunately, the news was typically of a dismal sort.

"Stock prices are down again. It's a good thing I don't trust such investments. Earn your own money and spend your own money, that is the proper way of doing things."

"Yeah, yeah, sure." Eva agreed, for to do otherwise was asking for a long-winded conversation she didn't need.

"Speaking of proper things..."

Eva sighed loudly and mumbled, "Were we now?"

Natasha continued speaking as though her niece had never spoken. "Where is this father of your children? Why does he not wish to see them? Hm? Why?"

She had never told her about Chris or anything at all about the man who should have been these children's father. It was easier not to talk about him. Besides, her aunt wasn't really interested in talking about Chris. She just wanted to point out how Eva wasn't living an appropriate life. A woman with kids should have a husband and that man should be the father of the children. Obviously, life hadn't worked out like that.

"Natasha. Let's talk about something else."

The suggestion didn't seem to bother her at all and she smoothly transitioned into another news topic as though she'd planned to all along.

"These days nothing is for sure. That is why stocks are so dicey. I mean, look at what is happening this past year alone. Those wealthy or prominent people being targeted by those terrorists, whomever they may be. I think these terrorists are looking to seize control of the markets."

"Why would they want to do that?" Eva questioned, humoring her aunt.

"Why to control the funds of course. This country has quite a lot of worth if you know where to look."

"This country is broke."

"Ah nonsense. The government has all the funds it needs to do whatever it wants."

The rest of the time at Natasha's pretty much went like that, with idle chit chat being made and a little bit of talk with the kids as well. Then, it was time to go. A quick goodbye and the three of them were out the door, D and Al continuing to wave at Natasha until they'd made it inside and buckled up in the car. She turned on the radio, playing it softly for her children to listen to on the ride home. They liked soothing sounds as much as she herself favored soothing images such as her sunrises.

Once back home, the trip to the store saved for another day, she hurried the two little ones inside and set about readying them for sleep. It was getting late and Donovan tended not to want to wake in the morning if he didn't sleep long enough. Tomorrow was going to be a full day at work and she wanted to be well rested for it. She sent the pair of them off to brush their teeth and get their pajamas on before going into the kitchen to get a glass of water for herself.

Gentle humming reached her ears from where she stood by the sink and it brought a smile to her lips. It was D. He often hummed to himself while getting ready for bed when he was feeling particularly upbeat. Looks like they'd both had a good day. Nice times like these she would never grow tired of.

Placing the half empty glass on the counter, she made her way to the bathroom to make sure the brushing of teeth was done right. Eva found only Donovan there, awkwardly working the brush in and out of his mouth, but suitable enough to get the job done. Briefly touching Aly's toothbrush to note that it had in fact been recently used, she went back down the hall in search of her youngest. She found the child in the living room, seated pretzel style in front of the television, watching the late night news.

"Supervisor Martin Farcy from the shipping department of the Mercer corporation was found dead last night. Blunt force and a sharp object of some kind were used to kill him. Several of his security employees were found dead as well in the warehouse, and police believe the same terrorist from five separate incidents in the last year to be responsible."

Great, more unhappy news. The kind of news that gave her a knot in her stomach. Eva picked up the remote and switched off the television.

"Time for bed, Al, come on."

Her daughter continued to stare at the now dark screen.

"Aly, you heard me. Let's go."

"I like it here."

"What do you mean?"

"I like it here, mommy. I don't want to go."

"You can't stay there all night. Come to bed."

"Someone's coming to see us."

"Who?" Then she remembered. "Oh that's right. Leon and Claire are coming to see us in a couple of days. It's just dinner. No big deal. Why would you think that would change anything?"

Aly didn't say anything. Quietly, she stood up in her dark blue pjs and wished her mother good night.

She watched as her daughter went on down the hallway towards her bedroom and then shut off the living room light. There was a flash of a different sort of light across the large window pane. It was only a car passing on the street but it made her think of lightning. There had been a storm that night.

_The police precinct was chilly and only vaguely did she take in the murmurs of two police detectives and several agents discussing the case. Eva sat by one of the windows, staring out at the rain coming down outside. The rain was pouring down, the night cold and dark. Dark except for the intermittent bouts of lightning flashes. She watched the window, the wet drops pattering against the glass. Slowly, she lifted her hand from where it had rested on the round bump of her stomach that gradually grew bigger as the weeks passed. She took her hand and placed it palm first, fingers spread, against the window. Her eyes swept past her fingers to look through the window, as though she could see someone out there, someone leaving._

_Over six months since Chris had gone missing. Over six months of fruitless searching. There was never anyone to find. She just hadn't wanted to admit it to herself. Didn't want to be alone with the child growing inside of her. Didn't want to be alive without him with her. The truth of the dismal situation she had denied. A long ago cold case that had left one dead and the other listed as missing. Now the file would be official and state two had been murdered. The time for hope was over. It was time to let Chris go. He'd been killed six months ago and she refused to believe that truth until now._

_"It's time."_

_All of them abruptly ceased their discussion and turned to look at her. One of the agents came to her and placed his hand on her shoulder._

_"Eva, time for what?"_

_She didn't bother to move at all to see Leon standing just behind her. She repeated what she had said before and left it at that, knowing that he would understand what she meant._

_"It's time."_


	6. Conviction

_Eight Years Earlier_

_Belfort, France_

"It's time! Let's gear up and head out!" Chris called to the others, pausing in his own tracks in order to regard one of the newest members of his team.

Jake Muller never had an easy life, and after hearing all about Chris's tough living and troubles, he'd told his own story. Jake's mother was a lovely woman who emigrated to the United States in her early twenties. She met a handsome stranger with perfect hair and an accent. Oh, yeah, and the interminable habit of wearing a pair of black sunglasses. The recently turned nineteen-year-old was Albert Wesker's son. The evil man had procreated.

Never did he think of Albert Wesker as a man to have a family. But he did. He married a woman named Jane, who gave birth to baby Eva. Never did he think of Albert Wesker to have even one kid, let alone two. But Jake was his second child and only apart from Eva in age by about nine or so months (a few more months gone by where Eva never aged made the age difference a tad more complicated to calculate precisely).

Apparently he'd mourned his murdered wife in a peculiar way, sleeping with a young foreign woman. Wesker didn't love the woman and it didn't take long for him to leave her in the wind, not knowing she was pregnant. She returned to her home country to give birth to a son who would not have a father. Wesker... Asshole.

Unfortunately, Jake's mother had a chronic illness which kept her from working, making it difficult to raise her son in Edonia. As soon as he was old enough, Jake took a job as a soldier of fortune, a mercenary, in order to purchase the medicine his mother needed. Throughout his childhood, his mother continued to be enamored by Albert Wesker, her one time lover. A fact Jake never understood since the man abandoned her. His efforts as a mercenary proved to be for nothing, for his mother succumbed to her illness before he could raise the money to save her.

He continued the rough life he had as a mercenary, the only thing he ever chose to care about any more being money. Jake worked for an Eastern European mercenary faction and was on a job to protect a town near Edonia, for a price, when he came across a young woman. The woman was an agent for the DSO (Division of Security Operations), on a mission to locate and protect the son of Albert Wesker. This is when he learned the reason he never got sick. His father had been experimented on as a young child and his DNA became..irregular. That irregular DNA was passed on to Jake, becoming immune to most, if not all, viruses. She knew this because she was special herself, taken in by her now boss, Director of DSO, Derek Simmons, as a twelve-year-old child in 1998. And Sherry Birkin was indeed a special woman. Her superb ability to heal serious wounds rapidly because of her infection with the G-Virus and subsequent vaccination to cure her of it, made her so.

Sherry told him about her father William Birkin, and how he was his father's friend and colleague for years. Although her father was really dead, unlike Jake's, who was only believed dead by most. Admittedly impressed by her honesty and blunt way of speaking, he shared with her about this latest mission and why he was alone. A woman came to them, wearing a red coat, to provide injections that the leader of their faction had purchased. The injections were to boost their energy and strength, but instead it morphed them all into monsters. All of them mutated into killing machines Jake had to take out when the injection had no effect on him whatsoever. Well, no negative effect. His body could very well now contain anti-bodies to this dangerous new virus.

Chris never thought he would think himself lucky but he did. His life had never truly been great by any means. Parents were killed in a car crash when he was still basically a kid, causing him to have to assume the role of parent to his little sister, and he was pushed out of the Air Force for having "problems with authority". The life he lived hadn't become incredibly tough until he was 25, the night of the mansion incident as a member of a special law enforcement team, S.T.A.R.S. So over the years the casualties had continued to mount during his period of..transitioning; from a law-abiding soldier of the government fighting bio-terrorism to a vigilante practically doing the same thing, then from human to something not quite.

It was amazing how focused Wesker suddenly became after Jake and Sherry joined the team. His repeated visits away from the group to a place or places unknown abruptly halted. There wasn't exactly an optimism and excitement to him. The guy never seemed "thrilled", well, ever. But there was one moment of progress for Chris with his long time ago former boss. He seemed to have accepted Chris as the appointed leader of their little posse and his own role on the team. This made him at least somewhat happier considering he'd learned from Billy Coen that Wesker had disappeared for the majority of the mission to find Sherry Birkin, once he received a phone call. Where Wesker went? No one knew and he suspected more investigation on his part would be required if he ever hoped to learn what the other had been up to over the past year.

The whole missing Eva thing came a lot easier to handle with Sherry and Wesker's son around. It was like Sherry was his replacement daughter, cruel as that sounded, the way he watched over her and regarded her during their interactions off and on missions. But Wesker treating Sherry like she was his own blood, wasn't truly the reason it was easier. The reason came from their ages. Both were young, and it reminded him how young Eva was. She was a teenager. Eighteen!

He couldn't possibly be in love with someone half his age, therefore he must not be in love. She was eighteen, so legal, but still so wrong. It made him feel better realizing how foolish his belief that he could possibly be in love with Eva Wesker was. Now she was gone, to go and live her own life, as it should be. Taking Eva out of the equation, Sherry and Jake kept Wesker grounded and he knew they would prove very beneficial to the team as long as this change in a bad man continued.

Almost a year gone by since Belfort had been initially wiped off the map and now they traveled to it for the first time, upon news activity had been detected in the ruined city. Four days after hearing this news, they'd finally prepared enough to head into an area outside the French city. A city bombed into annihilation nearly one year ago. There were several buildings miles from the ruined city, a complex more like, and Chris suspected this could possibly be where the latest deadly virus was created. If they found the origins of the virus, they could destroy it and maybe even Greene in the process. Though Darius excelled at disappearing so he could also very well be long gone since the city had been destroyed.

Chris resumed his quick walking pace beside Leena, pausing to glance sideways at Wesker walking a little ways off to his right. Ever since their two newest members agreed to join, Wesker kept Sherry Birkin in his sights at all times. Right now Chris was watching him observing Sherry and Jake, who walked close together ahead of the group. Rebecca was with them, her usual shy nature as an eighteen-year-old having given way to a much more mature and talkative 29-year-old self. At the moment she was working at prying out any details she could from Sherry, a former resident of Raccoon City once upon a time, like herself. She was doing it in the manner only girls could, talking about herself and then promptly asking the younger girl a question or making a leading comment to incite a response.

She wasn't that smooth though, and from what Chris could tell, Sherry wasn't giving up much. They were getting along and that was certainly something. Jake appeared, at most, amused, and simply listened as the two girls chattered along the hike to the complex. No matter. The buildings began to loom ahead. The start of the mission was upon them.

"Why are we thinking Greene will be here again? Why do we think this is the original lab that creepy virus was made?"

Chris turned back to regard Renny and Billy. It was Renny who was asking all the questions, when usually it was Billy showing skepticism and disbelief in their over-all mission to stop Darius Greene and his terrorism.

"Wesker. He says all signs point to," Chris pointed to the first building dead ahead. "So here we are, looking to make trouble for a troublesome man."

"Darius Greene? Yes, well, sorry if I don't accept a deux ex machina solution to this Greene situation."

"Hmm..." A pleased smile came to Wesker's face. That was never good in Chris's book. "A reference to me as a god, without my own prompting. Interesting."

He restrained himself from growling out some kind of response to Wesker's mention of seeing himself as a god, and focused his attention to Renny.

"Fine. Because as much as it pains me to say, Wesker is a smart man. He dug up coordinates, coordinates that trace back to where viral attacks have happened. These same coordinates were also retrieved from the Umbrella lab in Aurora I told you about. The one with the time machine monstrosity or whatever you'd like to call it. Recent activity has been occurring in this exact spot of late according to his surveillance."

"Oh, well why didn't you say that in the first place?"

Chris shrugged. "The other way was easier. Wesker, all knowing."

He'd said the last part very sarcastically and the man he mentioned actually looked a bit disgruntled by his words. His head tilted towards Chris, lips downturning at the corners, red eyes glowing through dark lenses. He knew Wesker had not forgotten how there was a time when he would like nothing more than to see Chris in pain. Yet day after day passed with them in one another's company, not clawing at each other's throats. It was a change, one Wesker apparently was not used to. He couldn't say he exactly was used to it either.

"Chris, we should split up."

Leena had said it to bring their minds off of one another, back to the mission at hand. Probably for the best. He hated Wesker. How could he be asked to work with the man who was directly responsible for the death and suffering of so many? Well, there was that daughter of his... Not going there.

"Right. There are three buildings. Wesker, go with Sherry and your son to the outer left building, Renny, Billy, and Rebecca take the outer right building. Leena and I will head for the central one."

Jake grimaced. "I wouldn't exactly call him dear old dad."

But he moved along in his appointed direction with the man anyway.

As Chris moved along in his own direction, he took further note of the building he approached. The building wasn't too old. In fact, he'd say it was built in the last year or so. As he made it close enough to place a palm against the smooth, hard surface, he could see there were no scratches or signs of aging whatsoever. There were no windows either.

"Strange design, don't you think?" Leena remarked, seeing what he could see.

His response came immediate. "Not for Umbrella."

She glanced sharply in his direction. "What do you mean? Umbrella Corporation is gone. You told me that."

"It is. But when it comes to Darius Greene, it's the same thing."

Leena brushed her bangs from in front of her eyes. "Great."

"We handled Umbrella. We can handle Darius, too."

As he tried the set of double-doors at the front and found it unlocked, she spoke as she followed him inside.

"You're so confident. How can you be sure?"

Chris took his first steps into the entryway of the building. It was a room that appeared to be like any typical sort of reception area. Directly ahead there was a circular shaped desk and several shelves behind it. Portraits hung along the walls periodically and there were unlit lights, fashioned like old wall lamps. The floor was in shades of gray tile, the walls an off white color. In other words, the place was dull, plain.

"I spent most of my life fighting Umbrella. If there's one thing I've learned from it, power tends to turn people insane. Insane people are easier to beat."

"Some might say your certainty of victory is overconfidence that may very well lead to your downfall."

"Some people?"

She looked uncomfortable. "Well, I heard Wesker saying it to his son. Jake didn't want to listen, if that makes it better somehow."

Chris laughed, eyes scanning the dark place. "Let Wesker say what he wants. Okay, which way?"

Sudden light illuminated the room. He glanced about himself in surprise and found Leena grinning. She stood in front of an open gray box. It was a circuit box and with a couple switches flipped, she'd managed to return power to the building. Slinging the strap of her favored rifle over her shoulder, she glanced around to take in what there was to see.

Leena Goessing was a good partner. She knew what she was doing and handled herself well when it came to unexpected circumstances during the course of a mission. It was a good thing then, too, that she hated seeing innocent civilians being hurt or killed just as much as he did. In some ways, she reminded him of all the years he spent with Jill Valentine as his partner and close friend. He missed her as if she had merely died yesterday.

"Wow... I wonder what this place was used for."

With light returned to the foyer, they could see how nice the room actually was. Everything was very fancy and very expensive. There was also a certain artistic touch to the place. Someone had taken great care to make the interior hospitable, friendly even.

"I don't know... Nothing good I'm sure."

"You wouldn't be able to tell that by looking at this place."

Chris didn't bother replying and instead started for a closed door on his right. He tested it, finding the door unlocked. The place appeared abandoned but they would take precautions in case appearances turned out to be deceiving. The room they entered was a room with a long table, several armchairs, a sofa, and flowers. It was a waiting area. For what, he couldn't quite figure. The flowers were dying, withering and blackening in their pots. Either the building was truly abandoned or their horticultural practice had fallen to the wayside.

After trotting to the next doorway, he spotted a short hall and several doors beyond. Behind door number one, an office, empty and filled with nothing of interest that they could see. The opening of a second door led to a small bathroom. Someone was hunched over, forehead to the tile floor. A woman in a modest flowery dress knelt, cradling her head in her hands. Possibly the receptionist of the front desk they'd seen upon entry?

"Excuse me, ma'am, are you okay?"

Leena got down on one knee beside the woman. "Ma'am?"

"Careful, Leena."

She glanced backwards over her shoulder at him and that was when the woman lunged. The woman's hands locked onto Leena's shoulders and dug in. Her eyes were red, skin pale, except for the skin of the neck and part of her chest which had reddened, potentially when she'd clawed at her own skin. Pushing Leena, she toppled into a seated position with a startled yelp, and became even more surprised when the woman pushed at her vest in order to gain easier access to her throat.

"Ah, help!"

Chris placed the tip of his handgun against the side of the woman's head and blew the skull apart in a single burst. Taking a step back, he returned the gun to its holster and extended a hand toward his partner. She accepted and he pulled her to her feet.

"Careful. The infection must have spread here as well. Like the French town, like the one outside Edonia."

"Great... Do you think this place was attacked too?"

/

"I believe the viral leak was intentional."

"Yeah? Where's your proof?" Jake skeptically asked of his father.

Wesker shifted in his stance by a podium to regard his son, who clearly didn't care to have anything much to do with him. He planned to keep a very close eye on his newfound son, and of course the daughter of his old friend. Chris had been right when the two exchanged a brief conversation the day they both discovered the existence of Jake Muller, biological child of his truly. The former BSAA agent said Wesker had had no idea he'd even had another child and he hadn't. There were a few weeks with a young woman about nineteen years ago. They'd found companionship together for a time and then he moved on. Things to plan and do and all that. Besides, he would only ever love one woman and she'd been taken from him by Umbrella long ago.

He extended a gloved hand toward the projector at the center of what was obviously a large conference room. The room reminded him a little of the conference center he had frequented inside the training facility James Marcus had run when he was a fresh recruit of Umbrella Corporation. He rose up from recruit to head researcher in a short amount of time, eventually becoming quite the ruthless and self-serving man. Yes, even he admitted the kind of man he became when he injected himself with an experimental virus. An injection given to him by his now deceased friend, William Birkin. Later dying at the hands of a tyrant, he resurrected with a cold heart and a determination to extinguish Umbrella in order to see a new future.

"This is a research facility and not simply an administrative building as the architects wanted people to believe when they made this place. I used to work in a building vaguely similar to this design. Turn on the projector and I suspect you shall have your proof."

Jake didn't look like he wanted to do anything Wesker told him and so it was Sherry who ended up walking over to switch on the projector. Unlike Jake, she was willing to deal with Wesker if it meant getting the answers she needed. He found himself intrigued by such an individual. She was a strong woman, who, though inexperienced, was willing to put herself in harm's way to keep others safe and to find answers. She spoke her mind and did whatever it took to see the mission through. Claire Redfield. Sherry Birkin made him think of Claire Redfield. Ah, he would be perpetually surrounded by people like the Redfields.

Once the switch was flipped, a video with audio came on and the three of them moved around to get a clear view of the large screen. There were several men in white lab coats, along with a single woman Wesker recognized as Dr. Mya Sheppard. She had worked for Umbrella and he'd believed her to have perished in the Umbrella labs inside the Aurora facility. The video was a little blurry but she appeared no worse for wear on the film. Another man walked into view of the camera and he knew this man too. Darius Greene was unmistakably that man. The terrible scars on his face made him easily recognizable despite the change into civilian clothing of a dress shirt and black slacks.

_"The test was a success. The target is immune to the C-Virus. No side effects were witnessed while his..current associates submitted almost immediately."_

Wesker was genuinely surprised. He hadn't expected this partnership. The composed and straight to business tone belonged to an agent for hire he'd used before. Ada Wong's image briefly flashed across the screen as the camera moved to her and then back over to the pair for whom she was providing the information. Black pants and a deep red shirt, Ada Wong it was indeed.

_"Yet you were unable to retrieve him. You failed in your mission."_

_"The situation became complicated. Chris Redfield and his friends showed up and discovered the target before I was able to extract him. Another was there as well. Sherry Birkin."_

_"You don't say... The young lady is supposed to be a special one..."_

Darius seemed distracted from his thoughts and turned from Ada to look at something else. Something that the camera was zooming in on now as everyone in the bright white room was moving to get a good look. A ghastly wail filled the room as what had once been the prone form of a man began to morph and change, mutating into something rather other than human. What was once a regular man, stood now at least seven feet tall with extremely pale skin. It had a muscular build with arms and legs that appeared abnormally lengthy. The hands had long fingers with sharp claws instead of fingernails, the head was bald, and the back was covered in hard scales all the way from the neck on down to the swishing tail moving to and fro.

A horrific scream filled the lab and the scientists were looking a little tense and freaked out by the creature inside the cage. The scaly tail slammed against the bars but they didn't bend. Undoubtedly the bars were some kind of reinforced metal designed to keep experiments such as it in.

_"Interesting..but not exactly what I had in mind. We may need a better source. Thank you for your services, Ms. Wong. We'll no longer be requiring them. I plan to use an old employer of yours in the next stage of this game, and surely you will have no desire to be anywhere near him after your less than amicable departure."_

_"Fine by me. Have fun with your toy."_

_"Oh I intend to."_

The film cut out, ending abruptly, and still Jake didn't seem satisfied by what they had just seen.

"Yeah? So? How'd you even know there was going to be something on that video?"

Wesker's face remained impassive as he picked up a typed sheet of paper resting on the podium and read it to his son and Sherry.

"December 29th, 2009. Tyrant model T-007, nicknamed Ghoul by its resemblance to the creature of myth. Ghoul was created through the combination of the R-Virus Variant and the T-Virus. Although the intended outcome of the experiment was a failure, Ghoul poses a usefulness as a bioweapon. It is controllable, intelligent, and deadly. Since its birth, it has grown from seven feet to ten feet tall and continues to increase in size daily. A new housing unit for the creature has been arranged and it has been frozen in order to cease growth."

"Look out!" Sherry yelled in warning.

Wesker shifted slowly to peer over his shoulder and casually grabbed hold of the creature's head, snapping the neck and kicking the thing out of balance. The zombified male dropped and he took the opportunity to crush its skull with the heel of his boot. Over by the projector, Jake swung around and fired a couple shots into another one of the walking dead after having raised itself up from an unseen spot behind one of the conference desks.

"Well, these shuffling sideshows are a piece of cake. Let's just hope we don't run into that thing we saw on the video."

"Here we go again." Sherry said with a laugh. "In Edonia we ran into that enormous infected creature and now there's this latest creation. We can only hope we'll be lucky enough not to come across it."

"Yup. So..where do we search next? You know, to find _actual_ proof that the viral leak was intentional."

"Tedious."

"What was that?" Jake demanded of his father.

Sherry sighed. How did she end up with this father-son duo? She prayed the mission wouldn't take too long to get through. It already looked like they'd uncovered what they needed anyway. This place was likely responsible for the city's outbreak. The only questions now, were why, and whether or not a similar attack would happen again.


	7. Fault

_Belfort, France_

Rebecca felt like a child in a candy store. She was standing inside a series of laboratories in the basement of a building that by first appearances, looked to be mostly for housing. There were bunk rooms, a cafeteria, and little else. That is, little else until she, Billy, and Renny came upon an elevator that led to another floor below the first floor with the use of a key found on a dead scientist in one of the corridors.

The standard glasses and beakers were spread about the countertops, along with an x-ray board that Rebecca saw Renny turn on in his curiosity. There were four images on the board of someone's brain, each progressing x-ray showing continuous swelling to brain tissue. While the skilled pilot soon became bored and wandered over to another section of the lab, Rebecca found herself drawn to the pictures. Her musings were interrupted by Billy's voice breaking through her thoughts.

"Take a look at this." Billy glanced her way before continuing with a read of the crumpled piece of paper in his hand. "Memo on C-Virus. Some further effects of the C-Virus, both positive and negative, have been discovered. It is more likely to have a positive effect after some tampering with the variables conducive to the creation of the virus. This is great news, as previously the virus typically had a 95% or so fatality rate. Signed, Dr. Sheppard."

"I don't get how people can just willingly do terrible stuff like this. They've got to know they're not benefiting mankind. No way, no how."

"Good 'ol fashioned human greed?" Rebecca attempted. "It is pretty bad when some of these people have taken the hippocratic oath and then do this. My first experience in a place like this is what made me decide to pursue the medical field as opposed to the science or military fields. By working in a hospital I know I am doing good and don't have to worry about the ramifications of my actions to such an extent."

"Not sure everybody shares your concern about consequences." Renny piped up with a grin. "Check this out. A memo from our resident psycho. And it's definitely some crazy stuff."

Rebecca tapped her foot impatiently. "Well, go on."

A final grin and then he smothered his grin in favor of getting actual words out as he read the crisp, white sheet of paper held gently in his hands. "The key to immortality and invincibility lies with Eva Jane Wesker's body..no longer. Samples of EW blood were lost due to Umbrella negligence. The gods are with us in this endeavor, however, and a new source has been granted to us. I, myself, retrieved a blood sample of an altered R-Virus from CR, and the work since then has spawned us the C-Virus. Variants of the C-Virus are currently in the works and there is no doubt in my mind that CR blood is the key. We shall achieve our ends."

"Resident psychopath is right." Billy muttered and turned away to continue his exploration of the room.

She had her own exploring to do and who knew what time they had. That Greene had yet to achieve the key to immortality was obvious. Like Umbrella, Rebecca suspected Greene and his researchers had only managed to create dangerous viruses and monsters. Immortality was impossible anyway. No manner of science could achieve such an impossibility. No one could live forever.

There were plenty of papers scattered about the room, materials for experiments, and signs of abandonment could also be read everywhere. Something had happened here. An evacuation? Drumming her fingers on one of the black countertops as she walked around one of the tables, she stopped when a notebook drew her eye to it. Leaning on the counter, she used her free hand to flip open and begin paging through the book. She ceased flipping the pages when she came across one that caught her eye.

Across the top it read: 'Description of C-Virus'. Below was the description of aforementioned virus. 'Subject becomes agitated, red-irritated eyes, veins darken (blood turning black), elongated limbs/torsos in many cases, increased strength and agility, ability to withstand much injury before ever succumbing to death, increased violent tendencies and indescribable lust for human blood.'

There was a list of the current strains following that paragraph. 'Strain one of the virus reduces subjects to brainless killing machines, strain two has the subject able to keep a level of intelligence-creating traps-they are able to control the other infected to a certain extent. Rarely speak, mostly grunt, growl, or scream. Strain one, stage two, excess mutation-occurs after 24-48 hours of exposure to the virus, subject's skin darkens to near black, limbs become malformed further, hands and feet become claws-the easier to dismember victims to drink their blood, and head enlarges, eyes bigger-still bloodshot, and teeth become sharp too.'

Shuffling again through the pages, she moved to the latest entry, dated a month ago. The scientist who had been writing a journal and notes in the book had written a passage discussing the man who was the key to the immortality they were seeking. He was expressing frustration and wonder about why the boss wouldn't just acquire the owner of the blood so they could experiment on him. Apparently this Dr. Sheppard woman was behind the insistence they leave the valuable man alone. That it wouldn't serve their purposes to take him. The very last sentence had her blood freezing in her veins. Why is this Chris Redfield so damn untouchable that we can't use him like all the rest of the people we use for lab specimens?

"Oh my God... Billy..."

He was at her side the next second, putting a hand on her shoulder and turning her around to face him. "Rebecca? What is it? What's wrong?"

"The initials CR. Chris Redfield. His blood spawned the C-Virus. There is an incredibly high chance the C stands for Chris."

"Chris virus? They couldn't come up with anything better than that?" Renny scoffed.

Billy shook his head. She wasn't sure if it was at Renny's attempt to lighten the situation or just at the discovery in general. A screech interrupted any further thoughts on the topic at hand. There was something with them in the labs. Renny had his assault rifle ready in a second, Billy was switching the safety off of his own gun, and although Rebecca was a little slower to the draw, she held her gun prepared enough by her side. It had been a long time since she had reason to use a gun, but she knew if the time came, she would be able to act.

"Why can't we ever explore a place without something trying to eat us or rip us to shreds?" Billy asked.

She smiled. Valid question. Invalid time or place. Something was coming towards them and they had to be ready for it.

/

"Are you ready?"

Leena nodded, lips thinned and tight as she focused all of her energy on the creatures charging at them. Once people, she forced herself to view them as nothing more than animals. The animal instinct to attack and feed was the only thing that remained, so it wasn't a stretch to think of them in that way. A single headshot took the nearest one down, and she moved on to seeking out the next target. About twenty minutes ago, they'd become trapped in this cavernous room by a mad man.

She ran away from another infected who got a little too close and broke into a full on run when something enormous broke through the wall just beside her. Shit! What the hell was that thing? The creature was hideous, a tad reptilian with the razor sharp teeth and claws, and the scales on the back complete with a long, swinging tail. It had to be at least twelve feet tall, maybe more. She and Chris just had to go and get themselves into this predicament, hadn't they?

The worst part was, they'd sort of been able to see this coming. They'd been a little distracted by a post-it note on one of the desks in a bedroom that had infuriated Chris and shocked Leena. It had been a minor note stating that the R-Virus Variant had been manipulated into the C-Virus, C-Virus named after Chris, whose blood had been infected with the R-Virus Variant, which they used in the creation of the new virus. The discovery had distracted the pair so much that they almost entirely forgot about the journal they'd come across in a bunk room. A journal belonging to one of the guards. The latest entries had been about the beginnings of some disturbing changes that read as the following:

_February 28th, 2010_

_There was an incident down in the lab tonight. I was off-duty but Gerald told me all about it. Apparently the T-Virus and R-Virus Variant were released in gas form, causing the instantaneous deaths of several scientists and a pair of janitors. There was only one survivor of the people that were down in the labs. One of the scientists. Those guys need to be more careful. From what I hear, the viruses down there are incredibly dangerous and I do not want to become some zombie like those poor saps way back in the '90s._

_March 12, 2010_

_I can't find Tim. He's the one janitor who actually has a sense of humor. Usually cleans the main house and we get dinner together a couple times a week. We both work late nights so it works well. Just a few days before, Gerald went and quit. That doesn't make sense. He seemed content enough here and we're friends. Why wouldn't he tell me?_

_March 27, 2010_

_I have to get out of here. There is something terrible going on in this place. People keep disappearing. It seems like every week, a new person is missing. I think I know who it is, too. Ever since that lab accident, the scientist who survived has been acting funny. I think he's gone crazy, just completely lost it._

_March 29, 2010_

_The boss has left. A handful of the scientists have gone, too. They've gone to another facility to experiment with some newly obtained sample of the G-Virus. Why would they leave for some new facility? What about this one? I feel like I'm getting more and more paranoid. First with suspecting that scientist is insane and now being suspicious of the big boss just taking off like that. Maybe it's because I haven't been feeling well of late._

_March 30, 2010_

_My mind is a jumbled mess. I can't concentrate and I've been forgetting to go to my shifts. I've just been feeling so tired lately, sluggish. They've been cranking the heat so high. I'm always feeling hot and itchy. Ugh! I can't stand feeling like this._

_April 3, 2010_

_I saw crazy man. He saw me and grinned. Hate grin. Want to rip his face off. He was wearing funny mask. Why? No gas here. God, can't stop scratching. So hot, so itchy._

Chris and Leena knew what happened to the guard writing the journal. Chris had seen it before. They both had the unfortunate occurrence of running into the crazy scientist mentioned in the guard's journal as well. Ran into him long enough to see his manic grin before he'd flipped a switch, triggering a lift that lowered the two into a very large, circular room, an arena of sorts. Judging by the amount of blood spatter, they weren't the first to have been lowered into this trap. And it was a trap. Parts of the wall opened up at periodic times, revealing cages that then opened to allow creatures to escape.

Speaking of said man..his voice was coming over an unseen loudspeaker. "You're doing quite well in this game of mine. No one has lasted to level five, the big finale, so to speak. He is quite a frightful sight, don't you think? The Ghoul. It's what we call it. And it is as deadly as it looks. Since it is unlikely you will survive for much longer, let me share a little secret. I suspect you came to this place, looking for the source of the C-Virus spreading across the city near here. You found it. It was I who spread the virus in the city. Greene knew of my passion to experiment and allowed me to take an employee here and there to put in my arena. When he decided it was time to pack up and leave, I released the T-Virus throughout the compound as a means to wipe everything clean for him. See, Darius understood me. He knew about my compulsions, my need to test the limits of others, and embraced it. He told me to spread my wings, branch out, show the glory and power I'd obtain from dominating person after person. Domination leads to creation. Domination leads to creation."

"You're insane!" Chris yelled out, not even sure the man could hear him. "Darius Greene used you to show his own power, to show he was capable of influencing others. He used your insanity in order to reach his own ends and send a message to people like me trying to stop him!"

Apparently the man in the box above could hear him, because he returned a reply. "No matter. Even if Greene gets what he wants, so do I. Better watch your partner there. Ghoul is getting dangerously close. Do you think you'll survive for much longer? Good luck."

Chris made himself forget the crazy man for now, and took in the options available to them. "Leena! Forget fighting this thing. We don't have the firepower to take it down."

"What do we do?"

"We run!" he shouted, and took off running for the gaping hole the "Ghoul" had left behind when it first came ramming into the arena.

The gigantic creature spun in his direction faster than it seemed possible, and appeared to be practically gliding towards him. He could see where it got its nickname. A few carefully aimed shots from Leena's sniper rifle sent the creature rearing back and then towards her. She switched to her assault weapon and just kept firing. It was enough of an opening to allow Chris to reach the gape in the wall and then he was providing cover fire for his partner in turn.

They both managed to escape through the hole and found themselves in a hallway. A very torn apart and decimated hall. They continued to sprint away from the room, hearing the monster screeching furiously behind them, getting closer.

"So what's the plan?"

"Run, shoot, run..find a better weapon and kill that thing." Chris explained to her between gasps as he raced onward.

Leena pushed herself harder to align with Chris's faster speed the best she could, asking, "Right. So, what exactly is the plan then?"

Despite his obvious exhaustion, he managed to give her a smile as he answered. "We find a weapon that can actually damage this thing. There's gotta be something laying around this place."

"And if there isn't?"

Chris chose not to answer her and instead fired a few rounds at the big monster crushing wall and ceiling as it pounded towards them. They raced past another bunk room, a small cafeteria, and into the ultimate jackpot. An open room labeled generator room, but as soon as they'd been in there thirty seconds, Chris knew he'd found what was needed.

"Yes! These idiots still use self-destruct sequences in easily accessible places! Leena, distract that freak. I'm going to set off the self-destruct."

"Got it!"

Leena took off in the opposite direction of her partner, moving through the room and out the other door. The creature missed Chris ducking over to the left entirely, and continued its straight path after the woman. He would have to be quick though. She couldn't avoid something that giant forever. Making it to the computer stationed up on a low platform, he cursed when he saw the blinking red screen demanded a password. How the hell was he supposed to figure out the password with only minutes available to him? Another howl from a room somewhere nearby told him he likely had less than a minute.

Gunfire that sounded a lot like a handgun reached his ears. Leena didn't have a handgun. Perhaps someone else had joined the fight? He hoped it was a friendly and not the psycho who'd put them down to this lower level in the first place, setting lose all sorts of mutated animals to come at them. Password. Focus Chris. What kind of password would these people use? Wait. The crazy man. He and Darius had shared some sort of psycho bond. He recalled a phrase heard from the mad scientist and also the same phrase he'd seen written in blood along several corridors and on the floor of a few rooms. Taking the chance, he typed it in.

_Enter Password: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __

_Enter Password: DOMINATION_

_Entered_

_Processing..._

_Processing..._

_Password accepted_

_Final Security Prompt loading..._

_Final..what? What the hell did that mean? He cursed a long string of curses in his head at seeing the question that popped up next, followed by a line in which he was to input his answer._

_Who is the key to immortality?_

_Enter Response: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __

There was a space between the blinking blanks and he wondered, did this thing actually want a name? There had to be at least a dozen possibilities. Maybe far more than that. How could he possibly know what this psycho babble meant? Apparently the people here were working towards a way to achieve immortality. Everybody was crazy. There was no way he was just going to be able to guess the correct response.

"Chris!"

He turned and was startled at who he saw coming his way at a jog. "Rebecca! Where's Billy and Renny?"

"They're out there taking on that monster with Leena. I'm here to assist you. We need to get out of here. Wesker, Jake, and Sherry are waiting outside. They've found what we need and now it's time to make ourselves scarce."

"Yeah, after we take care of this place, and that thing."

She nodded. "Right!"

Coming up onto the platform, she walked over to peer down at the computer screen along with him. "Who is the key to immortality?"

"Can't figure out what that could mean. Maybe these guys are crazier than I thought."

"Oh! I know the answer to that." Then she appeared uneasy all of a sudden, glancing to the side to look at him. "You won't like it."

He stared at her, utterly lost. "What are you talking about?"

She gently jostled him out of the way of the computer and typed in her answer to the security question.

_Who is the key to immortality?_

_Enter Response: Chris Redfield_

In horror, he observed the computer accept the answer and then ask if the self-destruct sequence should be initiated. Rebecca answered in the affirmative and stepped away from the computer in order to look up at Chris's stunned face. He couldn't understand how that could be.

"I found several materials making mention of the R-Virus Variant, what's in your blood. One thing had your name written down. I'm sorry, Chris. I don't know how he got a sample of your blood, but..he did and they've been using it."

After a moment of being quiet, he asked, "My blood..It _is_ what made the C-Virus, isn't it?"

"I'm afraid so. The C is for your name."

She'd said it timidly, like she worried he'd start beating up the computer any second now. Though Chris was in fact raging inside, he swallowed it down. He had to. This was not Rebecca's fault and he needed to be in control of himself. Besides, he'd seen the post-it not so long ago that made mention of the virus named after the blood leading to its development. His blood.

He recalled the moment when Darius had quite literally sucked the blood right out of him in order to deposit the fluid into a vial. Blood that had likely been duplicated in order to be used for his own vile purposes. Chris opted for humor in order to put his teammate at ease.

"Well, geniuses that these guys all seem to think they are, you'd think they could have come up with a more creative name for their virus."

Rebecca allowed herself a small laugh and then tightened her features. "Are you ready to get the others and get out of this place?"

He gave a very small smile before letting it drop and focusing. "Oh yeah. Right behind you."

Once out of the room, they practically fell into the other three members of their team, who pretty much shoved them out of the way as they kept running. Rebecca and Chris soon saw why. The giant creature was bleeding from multiple areas but appeared together and able to come at them with little trouble, tail swishing dangerously about. It was close to them. Too close. The five hurtled down the hallway and didn't dare look back. The countdown echoed through the halls, telling them they had less than three minutes to get out of the building.

At two minutes they finally found a way out of the lower levels and after making it through a few more rooms, they located the reception area. Chris paused in the doorway to the foyer, and motioned for each of his people to hurry on through. His eyes scanned the waiting room full of flowers, wondering if they had really been so lucky as to escape the reach of the monster that just before had been hell-bent on ripping each and every one of them to shreds.

A terrifying wail reached his ears. He'd had to ask, hadn't he? The floor below him began to tremble and shake. He nearly lost his balance and then he did, smacking his head against the doorframe and dropping to the floor. Leena was still with him and she pulled him onto his feet.

"Are you alright?"

Now on his feet, he glanced to the exit and then to the floor directly in front of him breaking apart in front of his eyes. When the wailing briefly subsided, he heard the intercom alert informing him a minute remained before the complex went down. He had to keep that monster here to be destroyed along with everything else. Unloading his entire clip on the head and arms that began to emerge through the floor, he ran out and Leena took over with what was left of her own ammunition supply.

"Okay, I think we overstayed our welcome," he commented to his partner. "Let's get the hell out of this God-forsaken place."

"You don't have to tell me twice."

Releasing her hold on his arm, she made a mad dash for the double-doors out of the building, trusting he would follow. And he did. There was no reason to be hanging around with the voice from the loudspeakers counting down from thirty seconds. A final glance behind informed him the creature was now almost completely onto the main level and would be headed straight for him and the exit, so he made his own exit at a dead run.

It was a close call. He made it out the front door, caught up to Leena, and the pair of them hopped into one of two waiting jeeps one of his team members must have acquired at some point. The wailing, shrieking creature was breaking down the front wall, whipping back and forth to try and speed up the process. It was at that time the explosions began to rip through the underground of the compound first, working upwards in its destruction. Thankfully the explosion tore through Ghoul before it could tear through the wall enough to escape. It sank into the ruins that was no longer anything but ash and fire.

/

Everyone was smiling, a couple laughing at something he had missed. That wasn't unusual. Wesker wasn't one for humor. Still, they were all very much happy, clapping Leena and Chris on the back or squeezing a shoulder in congratulations for their narrowly avoiding a crushing death at the hands of the B.O.W. Ghoul. He had to admit, the number of B.O.W.s Chris managed to take out was impressive for a human such as himself. Well, he wasn't entirely human. But the R-Virus Variant didn't give him much over his enemies except an ability to endure more injury than the average human, and heal completely from it. Such a gift would be a nightmare if he were to ever be captured and kept. Eh, the odds of someone bothering to hold Chris Redfield hostage were low.

Chris. Chris was a peculiar man. There he stood in the center of his team, smiling slightly, yet it was obvious to Wesker that he stood alone. Perhaps Wesker had made some wrong choices that resulted in such behavior from the ex-soldier, ex-BSAA agent. Despite changing Chris's life in a profound way, he remained with friends and allies. He had his sister, he'd obviously earned the respect and admiration of each and every member of his team, and grudgingly, he'd had Wesker's own daughter's heart, and..his own respect. The man was so regular, not much power behind mind or body, yet he persisted and accomplished, and remained resolute.

His daughter who'd decided she had had enough of the rough life and the lies Wesker told, had left him, and Chris, to go off on her own. He'd kept up surveillance on her once he managed to find her location, even bought her a house. She'd accepted but insisted he do no more for her and stay out of her life. Wesker knew his daughter loved him, no matter the type of person he was, but hated him for all the wrong choices he'd made, continued to make, on a regular basis. He thought it would mean something, remaining with Chris and fighting the "good" fight. She didn't seem to care. The bad outweighed the good, he supposed. He was a selfish person who even now, did good only in the hopes of bringing his daughter back to him one day. If she wouldn't even stay with Chris, a man he knew she held strong feelings for, he didn't know what his chances could be. Eva was a very strong-headed person who didn't really need anyone. She was brilliant, but of course she was, her genes came from him, a superior being.

Chris Redfield, now he was someone who was nothing like Wesker. He was the kind of person who might seem intimidating or otherwise focused, as he usually had a mission in mind, whether on or off duty, even as the vigilante that he was. In other words, he was a man with a purpose, and that made him confident and centered. He was very much grounded in reality as well, and would defend anyone in need. The general population looked up to people like Chris, someone willing or capable of doing what they won't or can't do. Chris was kind-hearted, perhaps to a fault, and worked endlessly to create a better future.

He was a hero, whether he wished to identify himself as such or not. Men like him were rare, and usually brought about their own end. Wesker doubted Chris would be any different. He might be the kind of person everybody wanted to be, but he would still end up like everybody else in that he would die alone. The good ones always did. It was promising for Wesker, then, that he wasn't good. He'd live much longer by his calculations. This world could certainly benefit from his existence and advanced thinking. There was so much he had to offer. The future would be a wonderful thing to behold.


	8. The Pursuit of Happiness

_Present Day_

_Sterling, Colorado_

_She pushed the faceless man out of her way and dove out of reach of a woman with a knife, also faceless. The people were always faceless in these types of dreams, dreams with him. Her foot caught the barrel of the gun in a third attacker's hand and she swung her entire body around to take him down completely. There was no explanation as to why they were preventing her progress. They simply existed in this place._

_Eva continued on, running as quickly as her legs would carry her. In this type of dream, even he remained faceless, but she always knew it was him. He was waiting for her. He was waiting for her to find him. She called out to him, but these particular dreams were without sound and he couldn't hear her urgent calls. She fought on. He was waiting for her. He'd been waiting for so long._

_The sweetest slumber would always deliver him to her. For a few precious hours, she would be granted what she wanted most. A love willingly given up in pursuit of a better life, then taken back when she'd grown up a bit and was ready to continue her life, with any risk that might come with him. In her dreams, whether for hours, or only precious minutes, she had him._

_Except her slumber was more bittersweet than anything. She had him, always at a distance. He would be there, just out of reach. She would call out to him, approach him, overcome the water, the enemies, the crowd. Whatever stood in her way, she got past it and would finally reach him. That was the exact moment when her happy moment would be ripped from her grasp. Every dream, no matter how wonderful or awful, had to end. In that happy moment, without fail, she would always wake._

When she yanked her head up from sleep, it was to reorient herself to where she was currently sitting in a moving vehicle. Eyes were on her. Someone was watching her intently. She knew just who it was and so it didn't bother her. Not really.

Her co-worker and friend was a person who she could depend on. Josh was loved and respected by everyone who knew him. He was the kind of person who might seem intimidating or otherwise focused most of the time, as he usually had an experiment or theory occupying his mind, whether on or off duty. In other words, he was a man with a purpose, and that made him confident and centered. He was an idealist, however, believing the best in every situation, while Chris had been more of a realist, understanding things for what they were. Aside from that core belief, the two were amazingly similar. Was it irony she'd managed to find someone good and caring and dedicated, like her Chris had been, while trying to get away from his memory?

"You okay? Forget that. I know you hate how much you're asked that exact question. Hi."

Eva smiled warmly at him. He could be downright charming whether he meant to be or not. Ever the endearing and likable guy. Why did he have to be so wonderful? They got out of the car together.

"Jonathan, grab the gear."

"You know, Diedre, you are capable of carrying the equipment too."

"I'm the intellect of this operation, and you, Johnny, are the security for our grand ol' team."

"So you're saying I'm manly and powerful."

"Delusional, perhaps."

"Cut the banter." Josh grunted out while in the process of removing something particularly heavy from the van. "We've got work to do."

"Relax Josh. Jonathan, you can set the monitoring station up right over there. Yeah, good, keep the infrared beside it."

Both men did as she directed with practiced ease. They'd performed this exercise before. All of them aside from their security man anyway. For Jonathan Andrews, this was his first time on one of their outings. The last one had proved perilous for Diedre, apparently, who was attacked by a possible homeless man while investigating an anomaly in a city about an hour from Sterling. The man had been watching them setting up on the side of a street and ran at them, knocking Diedre over.

She wasn't quite positive on the details as she'd been home from work, not even wanting to crawl out of bed that morning. The company didn't want to risk the safety of their top researchers any more than they had to of course, and so here they were, doing a rare occurrence of field work with a hired security guard. If her employers knew the things she'd been through and what she could do, they wouldn't have found the need for a protection hire. Then again, if they knew all of that, they'd have a lot of questions for her she certainly didn't want answered.

Eva supervised the set up of the equipment while ensuring it was done correctly. She was no technical expert, but she knew enough to know what went where and the basics of how it operated. It was Diedre who was the tech. expert on the team. She was good and managed to impress Eva on some level at least once a week. Eva really liked where she worked and those she worked with. Sterling, Colorado was her home and she was content being there. If she could just forget that empty space in her heart...

An hour passed, then two. Nothing. This was a waste of time. There wasn't anything out there. What were the powers that be expecting them to find out anyway? Every few months or so they would journey out into the wider world to investigate a potential anomaly, strange occurrences that didn't add up. It never turned out to be anything. The last time they'd found zilch. The time before that, the anomaly ended up being a wild wolf.

For five years it had been incredibly quiet on the bio-incident front, hardly a thing to report. This past year showed a spike in bio-weapon related attacks or incidents, however, and so field work became a part of their job at the lab. The goal was to uncover things to study in order to be forewarned of a potential arising incident. To be prepared for any and all incidents that could happen. That was what they did. Their additional work outside the laboratory never yielded much result though, only time wasted.

When the fifth hour passed and the lab hadn't called them to return for the day, she began to wonder. Why would they waste three of their best research scientists and a security guard for an entire day? They wouldn't. Was there something more to this little day trip thirty miles out of the city? What was she missing? She didn't like to think she missed things. It was a discomforting sensation.

"Maybe we should call Dan. There's nothing out here." Diedre complained, coming to stand at her left elbow.

"Uh uh. I'm not bothering the big man with a lack of results. That's the last thing he'll want to hear."

"There are never any results. This is pointless. Maybe we need to come up with a different method of detection."

Eva started. She turned to Diedre. "Say that again."

"What? There's nothing out here."

"No, what you said after that."

"Uh, you mean when I said we need to come up with something else to detect because we always end up with either nada or else a crazy homeless guy trying to steal my purse?"

"Wait a minute, don't some of these viruses resurrect the dead? As in, animating creatures without a pulse? I mean, those walking dead freaks? Kinda dead. As in, cold and dead. No heat signature whatsoever."

"Well, yes, but those are much older viruses that we rarely see any more. It's the new and improved formulas we should concern ourselves with, yes? Isn't that the point of our work? Find a way to cure the new viruses that have need of an antidote?"

"Wow so that zombie crap is real?"

Josh turned to stare incredulously at Jonathan and Eva was almost certainly wearing the exact same expression on her own face. Ignorance could be so very horrifying. When he found such looks upon him, the security man appeared a tad embarrassed but mostly, he looked annoyed.

"What? How am I supposed to know freakin' zombies can exist? The government covers up or lies about so much crap these days, the truth might depend on who you're talking to."

A cynical point of view. How not at all refreshing. A glimpse of something out of the corner of her eye. She spun towards the sight. Nothing to be seen.

"Is that a wolf?" the security man questioned, looking a tad bewildered.

Eva checked in his direction before trailing her gaze to the other side of the street. Shadows swallowed up a somewhat large form that disappeared into an alley blocking light from the sun. She hadn't gotten a good look at it. From this distance, she wasn't able to gauge whether it was even anything. One way to find out.

She jogged after the shape, really hoping it would turn into something. Josh called out her name, Diedre did the same, but she ignored them both. Footsteps followed behind her. Two sets. That would be Jonathan and Josh. Jonathan doing his job, and Josh insisting Diedre stay with the van and equipment while he sought out what she was up to. He concerned himself too much with her choices.

"Eva!"

"What, Josh?"

"Are you crazy? You can't just run off on your own."

"Don't tell me what to do."

"Don't be stupid then."

She glared at him. She didn't want to hear this crap. What was it about him that occasionally made her devolve to child-like behavior? Her attention became diverted to something else within seconds. Jonathan had been right. It was a wolf, and it was staring at her with glowing green eyes. Okay, so the eyes weren't actually glowing, more minor light reflecting off the eyes, but still, eerie all the same.

The wolf was the biggest she'd ever seen. Suddenly she was thinking back to the wolf sighting and report filed about a wolf from the wild wandering into populated areas. Could it be coincidence and this was simply another wolf sighting? Inside city limits, again? She doubted it.

Eva placed her hands on her hips and took in the furry creature before her. It was just an animal. Couldn't be a threat. The wolf howled and she nearly jumped a foot.

She inhaled sharply. "Keep it together, Eva," she muttered.

"Keep it together, Eva," a voice beside her mocked.

She punched Josh in the arm. "So not the time."

"What? It's basically a big dog. What's the issue? It's nothing. A false reading."

Jonathan drew his sidearm, pointing it at the wolf. The animal stared at all of them. If Eva didn't know any better, she'd say it was thinking, considering them. She put her hand on his arm.

"Relax."

"It's a freakin' wolf. A huge one! A wild animal!"

She couldn't exactly disagree but a guy ready to fire at some poor creature, not historically awesome. The animal wasn't growling or appearing violent either so it was unnecessary to put the creature down. Josh provided some reason to the situation though, some actual sound reasoning that had her questioning her own initial assessment.

"It's an anomaly. The equipment said so. We don't know what this thing is."

"The African mission almost ten years back yielded dogs who could split their heads apart. Vicious things. Would not want to get chomped by one of those." Eva considered. "Still..even if this wolf is infected, there are so many possibilities as to what it could be infected with or-"

"What about the C-Virus?"

Diedre had decided to join them after all.

"Diedre, the equipment?" Josh demanded.

"Right." She removed a taser from her jacket and patted Jonathan on the back. "Go guard the expensive stuff, Johnny. The grown-ups have real work to do."

He rolled his eyes, began to protest, spotted the growing glare on Diedre's face, gave the wolf one last glance, and then jogged back across the street to keep an eye on their equipment. Eva watched all of this before sighing and refocusing her energies on the matter at hand. The wolf continued to give them the stare down and Josh was busy analyzing the bizarre animal sighting.

"The C-Virus in an animal. Never seen that in the eight or nine years the virus has been known to exist," he commented.

"First time for everything." Diedre commented distractedly.

Eva recognized that behavior, the look she had in her eye. Her co-worker was in observation mode. It was tough breaking her from that. It was a little interesting to watch her at it, admittedly, so she let it go on for now. If they were to pull rank, it would be Diedre qualified to do it since she was the official head researcher at the lab. Out here in the field though, Eva was the most seasoned, even if they didn't know it.

"Josh?"

He'd disappeared from the alley. Where would he go? Especially now. She looked around fruitlessly one final time before returning her attention to the still wolf and Diedre. Approaching, she came to stand beside her associate.

"What is the move here, Diedre? You're going to single-handedly capture a wolf that may or may not be infected with a virus of some type which could mean it has become even more dangerous than it already might be in the first place?"

"I suppose you're right. We should report this to headquarters and get back."

"Hm... We got this. We may need a cage. A tranquilizer would do to help with that."

"You're joking. We're researchers. We don't have a cage."

"So you stun it into submission and I'll knock it out."

Diedre stared down at the stun gun in her hand and widened her gaze at Eva next. "What?"

"We-take-down-the-wolf. Together."

"I-I don't think that's such a good idea. Eva, we can't attack a wild animal. What would possess you to act in such a way?"

Right. Her co-workers didn't know about her past experiences. In this moment, Diedre was probably finding her kind of insane. Whoops. Not smooth on her part. But she really did want to figure out if this wolf was an actual anomaly in the typical food chain or just a random animal.

A second howl and then the wolf turned sharply to peer over its shoulder. It was such an enormous wolf. There had to be something different in its DNA. Fascinating. She really wanted to know more. It took off running. What?

Gone. Just like that. Eva started to give chase but forced herself to stop when Diedre shouted for her to do so. She couldn't avoid giving away any piece of her past she didn't want told, which could happen if she chased down a giant wolf and took it down with physical attacks. Which she could most certainly do. Even if it had been nine years since she assaulted anything, she could take a wolf down easy.

Downhill. That was how the remainder of her day went. She found Josh back by the equipment, and Jonathan on his phone with the boss. No sign of the wolf and no other signs of anomalies. They spent three more hours waiting for something to happen, which it didn't. She should have gone after the wolf. It could have been extraordinary. It could have been an answer.

She had a family and a calm life to think about. She'd chosen the life she'd always wanted, with kids and her aunt, and friends, too. She had a steady job now! Once upon a time she wouldn't have hesitated to go after that wolf. Eva would have relished any kind of challenge. She missed that life a little more than she would like to admit. There could have been an answer but she wouldn't know now.

An entire day of work wasted and she was sent straight home along with the rest of them by the boss. Apparently he thought even spotting a wolf inside a populated zone was enough to warrant taking the rest of the day off. That wolf bugged her. Those eyes..such a deep green, bright, not unlike her own eyes before she'd taken the experimental dose that cured her of the Regenerative virus running through her veins.

Finally making it home after picking up the kids from Natasha's, what should then happen? Her father called. Wesker called her after she'd been very clear about him leaving her alone and to her own life. It wasn't a mere call where he pretended to be a good, typical father either. Aly Jane Redfield had located Wesker's number and called him. Her tiny five-year-old baby had made a phone call, and to her dad of all people.

He'd been furious, too. All this time never knowing his kid had a kid of her own. It would seem Eva's daughter called to ask her grandfather to come find her because a bad man was coming and they needed someone to keep them safe. It was nonsense. It was bizarre. It didn't make any sense. Wesker had ended the call and waited to phone Eva until night, when it was late enough that he knew kids would be asleep.

She took pleasure in informing her father that she had not one, but two children. She told him they were almost six years old and he would never be a part of their life. He'd threatened to leave for her home immediately and she'd laughed, snapped at him that he wouldn't bother coming to see her even if the world was ending because he would probably be the one behind it. That was the end of the call and he hadn't tried calling again.

The following morning, Eva had a difficult time waking up. It was to be one of her bad days. She woke up to rush to the toilet three separate occasions during the night. She felt hot to the touch and was completely exhausted. Her head felt terribly heavy.

She called Natasha at an ungodly hour to come over for when the kids woke up. They would need someone to take care of them. Work was her next call, and talking to her boss, Dan Fielding, found things get even worse.

The previous day, there had been a break-in at the lab. Security suspected the theft occurred while their primary researchers were out in the field. The massive irregularity hadn't been noticed until the night shift security showed up and performed their routine inspection of each room in the building. Two viruses were missing. A vial of the T-Virus and several vials of the C-Virus taken.

Dan proceeded to ask her some questions about Josh of all people, asking if she'd had eyes on him the entire time they'd been out in the field and other strange inquiries. He told her of a government agent coming to see him about the theft of extremely deadly viruses, an agent accompanied by soldiers. He'd only caught the name of one soldier, a captain with the surname of Nivans. The agent's name he recalled clearly as Helena Harper. She came on behalf of a rather unpopular unit in the government who investigated bio-threats. People generally liked to pretend the group didn't exist. There had been five years of peace from bio-terrorism up until a year ago and most were still in denial that viral attacks were occurring again and the danger wasn't gone as they'd believed. The organization was called DSO or something along those initials.

Possibly it was the group Leon was a part of but she couldn't remember. She didn't see him too often. She'd seen him recently though, at the gravesite, and she would see him again for dinner the following evening. Him and his recent girlfriend turned betrothed. She smiled at the memory of a proposal and then promptly rolled over with a terrible migraine suddenly upon her, mushing her face into the pillow.

Her boss made mention that Agent Harper insisted she believed something bigger was going on connected to the break in at their lab. She'd been the one to ask some questions about both her and Josh. He had history with losing a family member to a terrorist attack utilizing the T-Virus in an airport, while Eva was someone who had years in between education and her employment to Dan unaccounted for.

An exasperated groan into her pillow when a knock sounded at the front door. Who could be here? Natasha had taken the children out to the park for a few hours to give her some quiet. There was no way her father would actually show up either. No way, right? Dragging herself out of the warmth, she grabbed a folded blanket at the end of the bed and wrapped it around her shoulders. After checking herself out in the mirror to ensure she looked presentable, she staggered through the house and to the front door. Peeking through the window by the door, she frowned, then unlocked and opened it.

"Josh," she uttered, not bothering to mask her surprise. "What are you doing here?"

He smiled warmly at her, standing with his hands in his pockets, pretending the rather chilly rain pouring down wasn't getting to him. Looking her over, he glanced behind himself before turning back to her. Josh smiled again and tugged his hat down so it was a little more firm on his head.

"I came to see you. Boss said you called in because you were sick."

"So you come to my house?" She glanced at the clock on the wall behind her, inside the house. "On your lunch break?"

Josh shrugged. "That's the third time this month you've taken a sick day. I was worried about you."

That was weird. He'd never come to check up on her before. She couldn't help but think back to the conversation she had on the phone that morning with Dan. A government agent asking questions about her and Josh at work. She knew she had nothing to do with stealing viruses from the lab. What if her friend had something to do with it?

"I wanted to make sure you're okay. That's all." He leaned in a bit. "Are you okay?"

He sounded so earnest, so concerned. She couldn't help but to appease him, even if she did so guardedly.

"I'm okay. I'm not doing the best. But I am okay and you should get back to work."

Josh looked into the interior of her house. He glanced about himself again and kept that smile pasted on. She knew it was for her own benefit and she found herself wondering whether it was an act of kindness or deceit. Damn it. She was really hating her ever-present trust issues in this moment.

"Josh."

"Alright, Eva. Take care of yourself."

He turned to go and she stepped out onto the porch to watch. A cursory glance back at her and then he was getting in his car and backing out of the driveway. She watched and waited until his car was out of sight completely. Somewhere in the near distance, there was the blare of a car's horn. To Eva it felt like a signal pointing out the growing turmoil she felt inside. She was trying so hard to live happy, and it felt like it was slipping away by some unseen force. A second blare of a car horn and she shook herself from her brief daze to go back inside the house.


	9. A Better World

_Seven Years Earlier_

 

_New York, New York_

The loud blare of the boat horn did nothing to distract the two men locked in a duel fast approaching its inevitable conclusion. It was as though everything was drowned out around them, becoming a blur of motions and sounds, none of them distinct. To the pair of men facing one another down, it was each other that existed and mattered, nothing else. The boat they were aboard preparing to dock, the fact that they were in full view of the public, was of little consequence.

"Do you actually think you can defeat me?"

"Strong words for someone about to lose."

Chris's brown-green eyes narrowed against Wesker's impenetrable steel gaze, for once the shades removed to reveal his red and currently glowing pupils. His hands tightened into fists as he took in how calm and composed his opponent managed to remain, despite his best efforts to intimidate. Still, his victory was all but assured. He had only to make the right move and he would be able to stop Wesker's power play right in its tracks. The inhuman man might have thought it a smart decision to try and take him on, but he was soon to learn he'd been mistaken. Chris had been preparing for this day for some time. He wasn't going to let Wesker win any more.

The taller man raised one of his bare hands in front of his face, spreading the fingers in order to apparently examine his fingernails. "Brave words on your part. Do you know what bravery is? The kindest word there is for stupidity. You will lose and then everyone will suffer. Best you accept your defeat now, save everyone the misery coming their way should you not."

"You don't scare me, Wesker."

The raised hand swept downward to rest back at his side but the sudden movement caused Chris to very noticeably flinch. Wesker noticed this minuscule reaction and smirked.

"I think I do, Chris. Now go on, it's your move. Let's see if you have what it takes."

Seconds ticked by in silence. The tension was palpable in the air. Whatever he did next, would decide it all. Decision made, he shoved his queen dramatically across the board, taking out the bishop lurking in the corner.

Grinning, he leaned back in his chair. "Check."

Wesker sighed and moved his remaining knight piece, black of course, and stood from his chair. "Checkmate."

"What?!"

He shoved himself forward in his seat, gaze sweeping across the board to examine any possible scenario that would prove his opposition wrong. There was nothing. How could he have missed the threat of the knight and a pawn? How could he have left his king so vulnerable? It made no difference now. The game was done, Wesker was looking bored now, and he-had lost-again.

His clenched fist slammed down on top of the board, knocking playing pieces every which way. "Dammit!"

When he caught a glare from one of the ferry workers, he mumbled an apology to the young woman and set to work retrieving the pieces he'd scattered everywhere. It was a rented board game from the ferry, and they apparently did not appreciate their games being swept every which way across the deck.

"Hm... It appears your confidence wasn't entirely overstated. You did much better than the last few times." Wesker admitted, though his words were likely lost over the grunts and grumbles coming from the other man as he paced angrily back and forth, trying to calculate where exactly he'd gone wrong as he gathered up the game pieces.

"Missed one."

Chris jerked his head up to find himself staring into very blue eyes. The closeness between them caused a small blush to bloom upon his cheeks. He quickly pulled back so as to not give Wesker any more ammunition he could use against him. The man dressed solely in black especially enjoyed hinting at his team member's obvious crush on him, even though Chris did not reciprocate in the least. He was a professional, after all.

"Thanks, Leena."

He accepted the rook from her outstretched hand graciously. She was fantastic in the field, the least he could do was be civil and give her the time of day. Thankfully he was saved from making idle conversation, when someone yelling drew both of their attentions to the dock the boat was attaching to as they arrived at their destination.

"Chris! Chris!"

His sister was waving wildly at him from the arrival dock, jumping up and down. Her current boyfriend of a few months was standing beside her, looking a tad embarrassed. Claire could do that to anyone. He sized the man up. This was his initial meeting of the first real boyfriend his sister had had since she broke it off with Leon about half a year past.

He was tall, wearing a nice shirt with a tie, dress pants, and a long, gray trench-coat style jacket over that. His brown hair was cut short and he had broad shoulders, a sure stance. A slight turn as the guy peered around at his surrounding allowed Chris a glimpse of the holster fastened to his belt. So her boyfriend was a cop. It gave him pause, wondering if Claire realized quite who she was dating.

Leena eased the now complete game-set out of his grasp. "I'll return this. You go say hi to your sister."

Smiling his appreciation, he made his way off the boat, ignoring Wesker, who for some reason had a rather disturbing look of satisfaction on his face. He really should have paid better attention. Instead his focus was entirely on his sister and her companion. Claire dove into him, wrapping her arms tight about him.

"It's been way too long, Chris!"

"You did move to New York. That's..far."

His attention had shifted to the man just behind his sister, now standing with his hands clasped behind his back. Former military perhaps? My, my, how this man continued to get interesting. He stepped around his sister in order to offer his hand out to the other.

"You must be Kevin."

"Yes. Kevin Donovan. I'm glad to finally meet the brother. You are..infamous in Claire's world. This one too, actually. You are, the Chris Redfield. Am I right? The man who went from being a famed BSAA agent, to actually bringing down a terrorist organization masking itself as a pharmaceutical company? All of this and after having to fake your own death and go on the run to do it. Just..wow."

He was aware the world had been informed of the truth, eventually. But he hadn't realized the government was that comfortable releasing so much information to the public. The New York cop seemed to sense his caution in replying because he gave Chris a reassuring smile and a pat on the arm.

"Hey, don't worry, even your sister won't tell me the details of all that. As far as the world's concerned, you saved our asses and we'd better be grateful for it."

Chris frowned slightly. He was pretty sure he'd detected a hint of resentment in that last line. It was amusing to learn the police were told he was a hero and was to be treated as such. All the more curious considering he was currently a vigilante pure and simple. Guess the government didn't care what he was doing, so long as it meant he was cleaning up situations which they no longer had to.

Erasing the frown, he gave the other man a polite smile. "So Kevin, how's the life of a detective in New York?"

"Ah, you know, like the shows."

Claire punched him in the arm. "Yeah, right. He's being modest. What he does is amazing. He is so great."

"Hm..so, Kevin, is your hair color natural?"

"Wha-? Yes..."

"Yeah I thought so. That brown hair is so light, could be blonde in the right light."

"Er..I suppose so. Why?"

"Oh, nothing."

Then he changed his mind. "One more thing. You don't happen to recall the day you met my sister, do you?"

"Why yes I do," he answered in confusion, then warmed to it and turned to Claire, smiling. "It was the best night of my life."

"Yeah that's great. So answer me this, Kevin."

Claire was glaring hard at him now but he pretended not to notice in order to continue with his line of inquiry. "Do you also happen to remember if you were wearing a brown jacket that day? Or perhaps something blue?"

"Chris..."

"Uh..it might have been something blue..."

"Chris..."

Poor Kevin. He appeared so confused. "Is this going somewhere?"

"No!" Claire exclaimed angrily.

"I think so." Chris said, then proceeded to avoid his sister's wrath as she tried to attack him with both fists.

Renny approached, expression all business. "We've got a fix on Wong. We gotta go."

Two years chasing after Darius Greene and preventing or cleaning up viral leaks. They'd done a lot of good, but the more experienced persons involved with weaponized biological experiments and situations were harder to get a handle on. Persons such as Ada Wong or even Darius.

Claire immediately let up on her assault. "You're leaving? Already? But you've only just got here."

Then she turned on the new arrival. "And you are?"

"Renny. Get out of my face! I don't know you!"

"Chris's sister. All you need to know. So now back to me. You mentioned Ada? Any sign of Melody yet?"

He sighed and pulled Claire away from his friend and teammate. "He doesn't know about any of that, Claire. And no, there's been no trace of Melody since Ada took her."

His sister looked disappointed but it morphed into anger at him again when she remembered why she'd been mad at him in the first place. "So you come here, start giving me a hard time, then decide you're just going to leave again?"

"Chris! You need to come." This time it was Rebecca and Billy, Leena standing not far behind the pair of them. "You need to come now. Wesker's got a guy cornered and it's not pretty."

Suddenly the satisfied look made sense. Wesker had spotted their informant almost right at their arrival and apparently had chosen to forget that the man was on their side, helping them. The tyrant relished in violence a little too much.

"That's my cue to leave. Claire, listen, I came to see you but I also came here for work. I promise I'll come back after this mission's done. I'll stay and visit for at least a few days. For now, a compromise."

Claire stared suspiciously. "What do you mean?"

He looked over to the boat, where the final two members of his team had yet to remove themselves from the ferry's deck. Claire followed his gaze, reluctance switching to excitement and disbelief in a hurry.

"Sherry?!"

They were girls being girls as the two met and hugged and giggled hysterically. Over nothing! Chris scratched his head and shrugged apologetically at Jake.

"Sorry You've been nominated for a visit with my sister and her boyfriend for a day or two."

"I'm getting cut out of the mission, to endure them..being like that?"

"Yup. It's what happens when you have women in your life."

"Chris." Claire had somehow made her way over to him again. "Thank you."

He knew she meant for referring to Kevin out loud as her boyfriend, not Sherry's presence there, however happy she was about that. It was his way of showing he accepted her choice in boyfriend. Still, he couldn't resist saying what she needed to be told as she leaned in to hug farewell.

"Maybe give Leon a call sometime soon."

Claire pulled back and frowned. She didn't have a retort, and he gave her a smile, then waved a careless hand behind to say goodbye to the boyfriend. His hands were shoved in his pockets, shoe scuffing the ground as though he didn't know what to make of this situation. Poor guy.

All right. Now to stop Wesker from terrifying their information source any further.

He made his way after his team, down a spiral dirt path. Stepping into the alley ahead of them, he yelled, "Wesker!"

Wesker deposited a sad, quivering heap of a man onto the cement and turned in Chris's direction. "Acquire a car. I have the location."

"He wasn't fighting-not telling you-never occurred-ugh..forget it."

The man adjusted his leather jacket collar and raised a single eyebrow over dark shades at him. "I was merely attempting to contribute to the team, Captain."

Utter contempt in his use of the title his team occasionally used despite his insistence he was just Chris. He rolled his eyes, visibly. "I love you too."

Leena dared to enter the narrow alley to join him. "Renny's getting the car. It's about a two hour drive from here."

"I'll drive." Wesker said as he strode past.

"What? No. I don't think so. Wesker!"

 

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

 

An hour and fifteen minutes later, Renny and Billy peeled themselves out of the back in order to drop out of the car. This was shortly followed by a brief bout of gasping and vomiting. Leena stepped out looking as if she would like nothing better than to lose her lunch as well, but she managed to maintain it, then worked to ease Rebecca out of the seat she'd become frozen in. Chris, however, watched Wesker step out of the driver's seat looking entirely unperturbed. He threw himself at the man, managing to snatch hold of a part of the long coat as he tried to reach up enough to hit him in the face. Whatever Wesker could do to him, Chris still had one hell of a punch.

When Wesker finally noticed hands clawing at his lower self, he gripped both of Chris's wrists and held them firm until he'd lost the strength to attempt an attack of any kind. He was feeling far too queasy for it to take long. Momentum gone, anger exhausted along with it, he let his head hit the car seat once his upper body was no longer held up by Wesker's hold, and peered up at the insane driver.

"You know, those traffic signs and signals are meant to save lives."

"Yes. But ask yourself, if I had obeyed them, would we be here now?"

"Well, another hour or so wouldn't have killed us..."

Wesker was already walking away, speaking as he went. "I thought not. This is the building, third one down."

Another minute later and the rest of the team managed to regain themselves, observing their surroundings for the first time. Tall buildings in the distance, but where they were now, all of the building were four-story at most and appeared to either be warehouses or apartment complexes. The building to which Wesker had referenced, was a three-story warehouse, seemingly abandoned. Yeah, right.

They went inside, Chris and Wesker in the lead, the other four following after them. Chris took his handgun out and held it at the ready mere seconds upon entering the place. There was something off here, something not right. He could hear Leena and Renny copying his play, while Billy and Rebecca became more cautious but refrained from taking their weapons out just yet.

It was in the air, the uncomfortably quiet feeling. A cold shiver rippled down the back of his neck and along his spine. He'd been in far too many buildings such as this. That quiet meant something bad had happened here. That quiet meant things were going to get ugly.

He listened carefully, holding himself in place. The others did as he did, even Wesker. There came the distant ticking of a clock in some room out of sight, a noise that sounding vaguely like shuffling, and a groan. Chris listened as best he could to that last sound, then tightened the grip on his gun when the groan was followed by a low moaning.

Chris genuinely wished that noise wasn't recognizable and familiar to him. It had been a long time since he'd confronted a real one of these monsters. The dead who refused to stay down. He checked his weapon and moved forward.

"Zombies. Watch yourselves," he warned.

"Oooh, zombies! One bite and you're-" Renny mimicked death by making a slashing gesture across his neck with a finger.

"Isn't there an antidote for the T-Virus? One bite won't necessarily mean death for us, right?" noted Leena.

"True but I wouldn't advise getting bit anyway." Rebecca said, coming to stand on Leena's left. "We don't have the antidote on us and well, getting bit by anything kinda hurts."

"Kinda?" Billy teased.

Rebecca punched him in the arm before taking the lead, heading in the direction of the only door in sight. Towards where undoubtedly the zombie groan had come from. Chris kept pace just behind her and trusted the others would follow.

That door led them to a series of other doors down a very dark corridor. Chris split them up into pairs. Initially he'd put Billy with Rebecca, Renny with Wesker, and Leena with himself, as it was how they usually separated. The pairings were those who worked the most efficiently and effectively with each other. Wesker shook off his partner and informed Chris that he would be going with him. The pilot shrugged and went along with Leena without complaint. The appointed leader of the team was a little less happy about this arrangement.

He waited until the others had gone through their designated doors before confronting Wesker. He knew it was what the man wanted. The act of overriding his orders and consciously choosing to be partnered with him definitely leading to this. He'd wondered when they'd have this talk but he thought it would be him to initiate it. Chris should have known better.

"Say you didn't do this."

Wesker actually bothered to glance about himself, taking in the warehouse and the infestation of zombies they knew had taken up residence here, even if none had yet to be sighted. He removed his sunglasses, pocketing them, and fixed his gaze on him. Chris met the stare head on. Two years working together against rogue forces of terrorism, searching hard for Darius Greene, who still held a grudge and sought power through the use of viral creations. Two years being nowhere near enough to dissipate the animosity they felt toward one another.

"I did not. I assume Ms. Wong paid a visit and things became unstable with her presence."

He held back the scoff threatening to emerge. That was putting it lightly. Ada was a force of nature and made a mess of things, whether she meant to or not.

"But that farmhouse down in Louisiana, was you."

"An unintentional side effect of your blood weaponized."

Chris tightened the grip on his weapon, wanting to exchange it for a magnum. The bullet from that gun would hurt more than the bullet in this one. Neither would kill the other unfortunately. No, as usual, he was the most vulnerable in the situation at hand with Wesker.

"When you took my blood that night, years ago, I thought at most you would dissect it and see what was responsible for its existence. I never thought you'd turn the R-Virus into something poisonous. You put Uroboros into the past for your daughter. Why not this one?"

"The R-Virus, in its purest form, destroyed my family. I seek to turn the virus into a creation that will change the world so pointless deaths like the death of my wife, do not happen."

"You, yourself, caused hundreds of pointless deaths. You've taken pleasure in hurting people. You're a far cry from sounding noble, Wesker."

"Then it is good, I have no need for your approval."

"She'll never forgive you. Not this time."

"Will you tell her? Speak with her, after all this time? No. You fail to even know where she is, how she has been, what her life has become."

"You know no more than me!"

"As it should be, when as you say, she couldn't possibly forgive me if I succeed in my endeavor."

"You'd lose her forever for some stupid insane mission to evolutionize the world? We've been here before, Wesker."

"And yet you never learn."

He'd been ready for it, on guard. Despite his preparedness for Wesker's inevitable betrayal, despite knowing this was coming from all of the secretive disappearances and shady phone calls, he'd been a fool and hoped he was wrong. Eva would have wanted him to be wrong. Chris was glad she wasn't here to see Wesker turn on his team in favor of another delusional quest to alter the world into something new. His second of hesitation because of who this man was to her, made all of his readiness mean shit. The blow caught the edge of his forehead and he dropped, unconscious before he hit the ground.


	10. The End and the Beginning

_New York, New York_

"Chris!"

His eyes shot open at the sound of his name. But even as he searched about himself for the source of the cry, he came to realize it was in his head. Chris knew this, because the voice belonged to Jill. His old partner was dead, a long time ago. He thought he'd lost her for two years, only to find her during an ill-fated mission in Africa, just long enough to watch her die after freeing her from Wesker's P30 chemical hold. That was three years ago and he still thought about her often, half expecting to turn around and see her at times. He'd never trusted anyone more than he'd trusted her.

As partners, they'd taken care of each other and complemented one another day in and day out for the sake of the mission against bio-terrorism, until it nearly killed her, then actually killed her. In their line of work, losing a partner was far too commonplace. It was one thing he didn't miss about the sham that the BSAA organization had turned out to be. A ruse of Umbrella's to keep a watchful eye on its most prominent enemies. He was happy to expose the lie for what it was and watch it backfire on the company, watching Umbrella disappear from the face of the world for good. It meant Jill hadn't died for nothing. None of the victims had died for nothing. Their deaths had spurred Chris to continue on, fighting for a future free of fear.

He sat himself up, rubbing at the part of his head where Wesker's boot had connected. A solid bump was forming already. He was going to feel that later. Clambering to his feet, he refrained from swearing out loud. He'd seen this coming years ago. The doubt for Wesker had always been there. Could a man so self-serving and single-minded ever change? It would appear for Wesker, such a man could not.

Chris figured he probably could have waited to confront Wesker about his less than stellar side activities. Activities that had taken up a proportionate amount of his time these two plus years they'd been fighting bio-weapon wielding terrorists and searching for the psychotic Darius Greene. He could have finished their current mission before stepping on the truth about Wesker but he hadn't. Being in a building likely teeming with zombies had dredged back up all those awful memories from 1998. The ones where most of his friends and allies died because Albert Wesker had led them into a mansion filled with horrors beyond imagination, knowing full well it would kill or nearly kill them all. Since then, Chris had been introduced into a world full of unimaginable nightmares. He tended to blame Wesker for that.

Right now, he was blaming primarily himself. He knew Wesker was sneaking off to continue his planning and experiments. He knew the man had never let up his scheming and desire for a new world order. Still, through all of it, he had continued to hold on to a hope. A hope that Wesker could really change. Even after all this time, that he could be the man Chris had once believed him to be as his captain and boss back in the days of the Special Tactics and Rescue Service, also known as S.T.A.R.S. He'd wanted him to be truly on his side for once, fighting on the right side in the world. Instead, once again, Wesker was Wesker, and it looked like the inhuman man had taken off to go finish his work on finding the right virus to make the world anew, and in his twisted mind, better.

Taking stock to ensure there were no other injuries on his person, he glanced around himself again. He was alone but he didn't feel alone. Which usually meant there was something else here. It just amounted to finding what was here and whether it was a level one, three, five, or ten measurement of danger. His luck was often pretty rotten. Maybe he would get lucky this time.

Chris considered the directions his team members were exploring, Rebecca and Billy, Leena and Renny. He thought about going in the initial area he and Wesker were supposed to investigate. Changing his mind, he went towards the painting directly in front of him, surrounded by heavy crimson curtains. There could be more to it and his instincts were telling him that idea was right.

On the outside, the building appeared to be nothing more than a warehouse. The entrance area was unsuspecting and typical of a general warehouse. Then they'd ventured into the next area and the corridors and it had become abundantly clear this building was active. Active in the sense that it was fully occupied and fully operational as a storage facility for what he strongly believed to be Greene's organization.

As he stood before the painting, he determined it as the deciding factor that this was definitely Greene's warehouse. The painting was newer, a year or two old maybe, and was of an Umbrella pharmaceutical building from the '90s. Oh yeah, and the entire building was essentially an inferno of red hot flames. Not exactly subtle. Darius's hatred for Umbrella remained strong and he seemed keen on expressing it through whatever means he deemed fitting. In this case, by way of a painting. An ugly ass painting.

Chris gave the frame of the portrait a test shove. It scraped sideways against the wall without any resistance. Far too easy to be unintentional. He removed the painting from the wall without further ado, pushing the curtains aside more to reveal a door. It was a metal door that blended in almost perfectly with the warehouse's dark walls. If he hadn't been looking for it he would have missed it for sure.

In his experience, it was the crazies who sought power on a global scale, and they tended to show their insanity through their methods. He seemed to get stuck with the ones obsessed with secrets, traps, and hidden keys or doors. He was really hoping once they captured and turned Greene in to the authorities, that particular brand of crazy would fall to the wayside.

The door opened smoothly and Chris found himself standing on the other side, not quite certain of what he was seeing. There was an enormous television directly in front of the door he'd just come through, playing a home video of some sort. On the screen were cryotubes and the video was surveillance, courtesy of a rotating camera. Three of the tubes were filled with fluid but empty of occupants. The fourth, second to the right, had something in it.

Chris stepped closer to the television to get a better look at the surveillance footage. There was a person in that tube. A young woman whom he recognized. It was Melody. He hadn't gotten so much as a glimpse of Melody since she disappeared from the building housing the time machine several years ago. No way was this merely a coincidence.

He pointed his weapon at the spot in the hall where a person was stepping through a doorway a few yards down. The person appeared to be waiting. She didn't flinch or look startled at the sight of the gun aimed at her. On the contrary, she appeared to have been expecting him.

He knew her. He knew that face. "The scientist. Wesker told me about you. How you let me stay trapped moving through time and used it to analyze my blood. Sheppard."

She smiled at him, partially turning from the still open doorway to look at him. "Dr. Mya Sheppard, yes. I, of course, remember you, Chris Redfield. Test subject 17. The only one to survive that abominable machine. I should thank you, for getting rid of it. More trouble than it was worth. Far too difficult to actually control."

"Yeah. You and your people always seem to create things beyond your control. Think you'd learn by now."

"Trial by error, Mr. Redfield. Once we achieve true success, all the failures that came before will be well worth the time and effort, well worth the sacrifices."

"Tell that to all the lives destroyed or lost because of people like you or your employers."

"Hm, well, I shed my ties with the giant ship that was Umbrella shortly prior to its own sinking. Joined forces with Mr. Greene, but he turned out to be lacking in..vision. I have acquired a new employer of late. His vision far exceeds anything Umbrella ever could have imagined. He knows what he's doing, and when he needs something, he knows precisely how to get it. The achievement of our goals has become tangible now. With my new employer, a new and better world is inevitable."

Chris nodded toward the television. "Melody. Where is she? I assume you showed me this video for a reason."

"It's live footage. I thought you might be interested by it. She's alive, kept asleep for all this time. When we find a use for her, without the added risk, we'll wake her. For now, she sleeps."

"Why show me this? What's your purpose here?" he demanded.

"I know what your purpose is here." Mya informed him. "She's gone. Missed her by a day. Her job from my new employer was brief and simplistic. A matter of removing an unnecessary variable from the equation."

Chris pondered what she was implying. "This warehouse belongs to Greene. Are you saying Ada's job has something to do with Greene?"

"I'm saying this warehouse used to belong to Mr. Greene. And soon, it will cease to exist at all. I suggest you and your people get out while you can," she warned.

Dr. Sheppard smiled some more and looked past Chris, at a spot just beyond his shoulder. He hesitated, then glanced over his shoulder to see what she might be looking at. There was nothing. Damn. He whipped his head back around and she was gone from the hallway.

"Sheppard!"

He gave chase, running after her through the door from which she'd come. He soon found himself in another storage area full of metal crates and boxes. It was full of something else as well.

When he nearly ran into the first zombie, he spun away and fell right in front of a second and third of the undead. A quick curse and then he was backpedaling away from the trio of walking dead looking to make lunch out of him. He'd lost some muscle over the years, but he doubted these zombies would care whether he was 100 or 300 pounds. Either way, he still tasted like food to these hunger-driven pulseless beings. A queasy thought.

Three headshots and he was climbing back to his feet. He grimaced at the heads that had popped like water balloons when the bullet had passed through their skulls. Not quite sure why the heads did that sometimes with zombies.

Chris continued on through the mountains of stored boxes, proceeding more cautiously this time. He avoided the undead where he could, and took out the ones that crossed his path. Coming to another door, he opened it and saw a metal stairwell leading upwards and down as well. A few steps downward and he greatly regretted his choice in direction.

There was something down there. There were webs, a lot of webs, and something moving among the webs. His eyes widened when the echoing of his boots on the metal steps appeared to have stirred the thing below. Hesitantly, he drew his pocket flashlight out and flicked it on to get a better look. He got a good look. Then he ran.

He pounded up the first flight of stairs, dared a glance behind, and kept right on running. It was coming. The ugly monstrosity had decided to pursue its newly spotted prey. He never could seem to catch a break.

Another two flights and he shoved himself through the third floor door. He shoved a zombie bodily away and found himself in line with a startled Rebecca and her handgun. He stopped for about a second before remembering why he was here in the first place and started jogging down the hall. When he reached Rebecca, he pulled her along by the arm, expressing his urgency to move by the abrupt tug.

"Chris!"

Billy had moved from someplace else to jog alongside him and Rebecca. "What's going on?"

"A ten. It's a ten. Well, maybe an eight but right now, I'm going to go with ten. Anyone got a shotgun?"

"Chris?"

"Shotgun? Anything better than a handgun?" he persisted.

It was Billy who responded. "I've got a shotgun. Do you need it aimed somewhere specif-"

He cut himself off when a pounding came from against the door Chris had come through. A second smacking against the door and the metal dented inward, big time. Chris caught his stare.

"What the hell is that?"

"Giant-freak-spider. Did I mention I hate the T-Virus?"

_"The Self-Destruct System-has been-activated. All personnel-must evacuate-immediately. All doors will be unlocked to expedite the evacuation process. I repeat-"_

Chris groaned. "Oh come on! How is this obnoxious self-destruct recording still around? And why do these people keep programming self-destruct systems in their buildings? It continues to blow up in their faces, literally!"

"Well," Rebecca reasoned, actually sounding as though she'd given it some thought. "These same type of people continue to delve into science they don't fully understand and often end up becoming infected with one of the viruses they keep around so..I should think they do not live long enough to learn from their mistakes."

He laughed. He couldn't help it. Rebecca, ever the logical and brainy member of the team.

Rounding a corner, when they made it to the end of the next hallway, they found themselves at the railing of a balcony overlooking a ground level storage area with a staircase on the left. They'd made it in time to see Mya Sheppard entering the ground level through another doorway on that level, walking at a rapid pace towards a sleek black car.

Chris was about to tell her to stop where she was, but then Renny and Leena came through a door just opposite of the one Mya had arrived from, saving him the trouble. When they told her to freeze, surprisingly, she did just that. Then she smiled, set down the metal case she'd been carrying, and clapped. He strongly disliked these people and their conceited mannerisms. Goddamn Wesker for continuing to be just like them still, even after the years working against them. She would be so disappointed when she found out.

Things began to click together just then, like the pieces of a puzzle. The easy access upon their arrival, the surveillance footage playing for his eyes alone, Dr. Sheppard coming across him and not being surprised or fearful in the slightest. The employees turned zombies, the self-destruct system, and even the giant spider probably. She'd wanted him to see these things. It had all been a show designed for him. Now the question that remained. Was she the mastermind, or her new employer?

As if hearing his thoughts and responding on cue, Mya turned to look up, directly at him and the other members of his team. He hadn't noticed before, in the darker hallway where he'd come across her partway turned from him. He could see now in the blinding lights of the warehouse's ceiling though. Half of her face and neck were pretty badly burned. It must have been a result of the fire in the lab from the bomb. Wesker had thought her dead from the explosion, or so that's what he'd told Chris. That had obviously been proven wrong here today.

Leena and Renny spotted Chris now, too. It was the latter who immediately shouted to him, eager to deliver news. The news concerning what their mission to the warehouse was all about.

"We found Greene! He's dead. Someone killed him. Greene's already dead!"

Sheppard pulled a gun and smiled that half smile of hers which made a whole lot more sense now that he knew half the nerves in her face were deadened.

"I'll admit," she said loudly, her voice echoing and bouncing against the large walls. "I soon became disillusioned with Darius's exploits. He was like many men who obtain power. Once he had it, he feared to lose it. The only thing maintaining that man's sanity for most of his life had been his search for vengeance. Once he had it, and power, his mind didn't take long to begin to unravel. He was a losing bet. I turned my loyalties elsewhere and so far, it's paid off. You won't stop him. You'll never find him unless he wants to be found."

Chris wasn't liking this. He glanced away from Mya to the metallic suitcase at her feet. Whatever she'd come for, she'd gotten it. He didn't feel it would bode well for any of them if she managed to get away. He came to a decision.

"Leena, Renny, stop her. Don't let her leave!"

"A new world is coming, Mr. Redfield. Best make your peace with that knowledge and your part in its creation. The R-Virus is a force to be reckoned with under the proper conditions. Once we find those ideal conditions, it will be only a matter of time until real change occurs. This planet is in dire need of evolving. It must happen or things will never get better."

She didn't seem concerned Leena and Renny were drawing near to where she stood. He knew there had to be a reason, something he was forgetting, but he couldn't place it. Until he did. He'd forgotten about the giant freak thing that had chased him up the stairs. He didn't remember it until it smashed against the far wall at the other end of the long hallway behind them, briefly losing its balance on its long, thin legs.

"Ah! The ten!" he yelled out in warning.

"What?" Rebecca questioned as she jolted about to see what the loud crashing noise had been and looked terrified at the revelation.

"Spider!" she cried.

Billy readied the shotgun in his hand. "I've got this bitch."

Chris glanced from the giant spider, down toward where he currently saw Mya still standing calm, and then looked to the pair standing with him. They sensed his hesitation and were quick to brush him off.

"We've got the mega spider. Go get her, Chris."

"Right," he agreed firmly. They could handle this.

He didn't hesitate to race down the stairs to the ground floor where Sheppard, Leena, and Renny were positioned. Barely had he looked away for a moment, but when he made it to the bottom, a fight had broken out. He took stock of the situation as quickly as possible.

Leena was throwing a punch at Dr. Sheppard, who turned out to be quite the gymnast. She was tossing herself about at incredible speed and dexterity to the chagrin of his female counterpart. On the other side of the ground floor, Renny was on the run from a second and third gigantic spider. Chris took another moment to take in Leena ducking a high kick from the secret agent wannabe scientist before sprinting toward the peril bearing down on his pilot.

He sent a burst of bullets toward the monster screeching high-pitched at the man attempting to flee for dear life. Chris managed to distract the creature long enough to give Renny breathing room and then hesitated to take some time to aim more carefully. Beady black eyes stared him down and the spider charged in an annoyed rage from the spatter of bullets. He reacted, throwing himself sideways to avoid the gaping mouth and gangly legs. With his luck, the spider would be packing lethal poison.

Chris landed a couple shots into the head of the thing and it only seemed further ticked off, swinging blindly to do any damage it could manage. He had to throw himself to the ground again to avoid getting hurt, and while he was on the floor aware Renny was confronting an arachnid alone, he observed Leena's progress for a brief few seconds.

She was holding her own, giving as much as she was getting, and there was the surprising factor. Dr. Sheppard had some moves on her. She was kicking and spinning and punching like the best of them. He thought of Eva then, briefly acknowledging he did miss her still. He allowed but a second to linger on her and then returned to analyzing Mya.

It was obvious she'd had formal training and it occurred to him that she might have more than one method of escape planned. If she was a high caliber fighter and scientific researcher, the probability was good she also served as a high intellectual planner, experience and all.

He searched for avenues of escape and was foiled by what was right in front of him. As he looked on, a sleek black car with tinted windows burst through the sole wooden box among all the metal ones. With no idea who was behind the wheel, he opened fire regardless, and learned the car was bulletproof. Inconvenient, but not a deal-breaker. Chris lowered his aim, directing his next shot to the front tire on his side.

"Chris! Look out!"

Right. Mega spiders. For the third time in maybe three minutes, he was tossing himself onto the floor to avoid danger. The life of an agent was tiring. Wait, not an agent any longer. Two years on and he still had to remind himself of that fact.

"Move it or lose it, Chris! Show me those athletic legs!"

"Wha-?" he cut himself off when he saw what Renny meant.

He burst up from the ground and ran without faltering. The explosion followed a little too close for comfort, the heat at his back. Following the bomb, he spun around and watched as Renny lobbed a second grenade upwards to where Billy and Rebecca were struggling with the first of the big spiders. The third monster arachnid to arrive was in the process of crawling up the wall towards where the pair was battling the T-Virus infected creature.

Things spiraled onward from there. The grenade landed in the mouth of the creature, Billy and Rebecca dashed down the staircase, Sheppard got a solid punch in, knocking Leena to the floor, and made good her escape to the black car idling nearby. Chris tried one last time to blow out a tire to prevent her from going, but his shot was nowhere close to landing.

Chris rushed to Leena's side, pulling her to her feet, and Renny joined them. Billy and Rebecca glanced their way to see they were okay but didn't stop running. They'd heard what he'd managed to push to the back of his mind while he was in the middle of three enormous spiders and the trouble that was Mya Sheppard. The final warning call from over the loudspeaker for the self-destruct system. They were just about out of time to get out of the building before it blew.

"Hey," he heard Renny say. "Where's Wesker?"

"Gone." Chris gave the other a look that spoke volumes. "Gone and he won't be coming back."

"Ah shit," was his response, which pretty much said it all, too.

Leena grabbed their attention, preventing them from dwelling on this turn of events for their group.

"We've got to move. Come on!"

Together they ran, trailing after Billy and Rebecca, who'd made a path for themselves out of the building by way of the car-sized hole in the warehouse siding. He was vaguely aware of the start of the explosions and then he wasn't thinking much except to keep putting one foot in front of the other at his dead run.

They were down a member, Wesker deciding to give in to his viral induced psychosis apparently. They had learned Darius Greene was dead, probably a day ago at Ada's doing. Dr. Mya Sheppard, discovered still living and well, was working for an unknown employer and it seemed Ada might be working for the same employer. He considered the possibility Wesker had known Sheppard remained alive and said nothing. What he cared about most right now though, was that this Sheppard and her employer were holding Melody somewhere. A bleak summary of the end result of their mission most certainly.

He'd garnered a substantial amount of information but had gained no real direction to aid them in putting that information to use. They'd come to the end of their current mission, and found themselves continuing to face a whole lot of adversity. He was really hoping nothing was going to come of Dr. Sheppard and her mysterious employer. After all, hope was all he had these days.


	11. Fall For You

_Six Years Earlier_

_Sterling, Colorado_

They had embraced in the cemetery beside Jill Valentine's grave. Three years apart from one another and they were together again, finally. Eva had come back, had found him. He was touched she remembered the anniversary of Jill's death in Africa, remembered where her official grave had been made, and known him enough to know he would be there on that day to remember the brave woman.

After paying her own respects to Jill's memory, though she had not known her in life, Eva asked him to come and stay with her. He was on temporary reprieve from working missions with his vigilante team consisting of Leena, Renny, Rebecca, Billy, Sherry, and Jake, and had the time. The only thing he paused to consider, was whether saying yes and going to stay with her would be wise. Eva was 20, he was forever stuck at the age of 35, and he loved her. He said yes.

They arrived at Eva's house and went immediately inside. They spent the next hour reacquainting themselves with one another after having endured the long duration of time out of contact. Chris was surprised by how much older three years and viral free living made her appear. She'd definitely grown. He could see that when they broke apart from their kissing to really take a look at each other. Civilian life had done wonders for her.

The rest of the first night was spent talking. He listened with genuine interest as she told him all about her research position in a laboratory, living a normal life, and being fully human. She confessed spending time with her aunt, holding an actual job, and making friends, had made her happier than she'd ever been her entire life. Then she'd gotten a certain gravity to her and stared him directly in the eyes when she told him the downside to her life. She was lonely. Because she had been without him.

He didn't think a woman had ever been so straight with him, wasting no time in telling him how much he meant to her. How could someone care about him so much when he was just..him? Only good at fighting and taking down those that needed to get taken down. Was he actually romance material? He'd never taken the time to bother dedicating himself to a woman. Eva was different and he came to understand that fact the very first night. Chris volunteered to sleep in the guest bedroom when she tried to invite him to her room. She refused his offer and ignored his hesitance, and they'd spent the night asleep in one another's arms.

Every night for that first week went pretty much the same. Eva went to work during the day, Chris stayed in the house, essentially wondering what the heck to do with himself with so much downtime. When Eva would come home, they ate dinner together and spent the night talking. They would talk about any number of things, including his sister Claire, Eva's aunt, the work of a scientific researcher on the path to creating cures that she'd become, the decrease in biological incidents thanks primarily to Chris's team's efforts, and of course, Eva's father came up at one point. He'd been calling. She'd been ignoring. So far it was working out pretty well.

The first day Chris returned to meeting with his team on a regular basis to keep one another updated on the current rate of terrorism and where they might need to investigate, Eva didn't really want him to go. It was a Saturday and she wanted to spend the day with him. He had to go though, so she watched him from the window as he walked down the driveway and into the car he'd rented. She sometimes had to use her own vehicle without prior notice if the lab needed her to come in for any reason whatsoever, and so hadn't been able to loan hers out to him. Something made him look back toward the house, and she'd put her hand on the window as a sort of goodbye. The motion made him feel warm inside all of a sudden and it brought a smile to his lips.

Every time he had to leave the house from that day forward, Eva continued to do the same thing. Probably looking to evoke the same reaction. He smiled every single time. It was nice to know someone would miss him, that someone would be there for him to come home to. Those moments as he walked from the front door to his car told him what he'd already known really. He was in love with Eva Jane.

A month into Eva's return and their choice to live an almost domestic life together in her house, Chris asked her to marry him. He had never been one for marriage before. He'd never seen the point and he'd always been too busy for any thoughts of the kind. With Eva, it was just obvious what he wanted was to spend the rest of his life with her. Marriage was that kind of deal, right? So he went for it. She laughed, said yes, then cried much to his distress. She convinced him they were tears of joy and the following night they made it official in a courthouse. It was just the two of them and a young couple they'd met on the way, whom they talked into being their witnesses for the occasion.

Their marriage didn't change much of anything. They were already living together, happy and content, but they did consummate and oh yeah that was certainly sweet. The most intriguing and memorable thing about that special night, came after. Chris laid beside Eva on the bed, her head resting on his chest and the fingers on one of her hands walking up and down one of his arms. It felt nice but he realized they hadn't exchanged rings. The union had happened sudden, but that didn't mean he hadn't been thinking about the possibility of it happening with her one day.

Gently, he removed her from him and reached for something in the bedside dresser on his side. He took out the item he'd held on to for over a year, wondering if he would see Eva again to give it to her. It was a necklace. A diamond choker that once belonged to his mother, passed on from her step-mother, who'd given it to her the day his mom tied the knot with his dad. He asked Eva to turn away from him and then placed it around her neck. She'd been speechless. When she finally found her voice, it was to try to reject it. She argued that she couldn't possibly deserve something so lovely and he'd laughed and told her he couldn't possibly deserve her, yet here they were, together.

Chris had taken the moment to confess he'd thought a lot about her all the time they were apart, when she'd gone off to live a normal life away from the kind of life he'd chosen. He told her how he couldn't see past the age and thought it was wrong. But when she was gone, he actually ached for her. Then she'd come back and an age difference that had once seemed so glaring and important, no longer meant anything when he'd felt the connection resurge between them in the cemetery the day she returned to him. They were meant to be together, he dared to say.

She had looked at him then, hard, like she didn't know quite what to make of him basically going out on a limb and calling them soulmates. Letting her hand fall from the necklace, she placed it instead on the side of his face, and looked into his eyes. He loved how blue they could seem when she was entranced or full of energy or just plain happy. When she smiled, he knew he was off the hook. She wasn't turned off by confessions of a love sick man who'd just given her a very expensive gift.

"I don't know about 'meant to be' actually being a thing, but I do know I love you and nothing feels as good as when I'm beside you." She smiled wide and switched her gaze from his eyes to his head. "Did you cut your hair? It's shorter. It's definitely shorter."

He had gotten a haircut before their private exchange of vows, but it really didn't seem the point in this moment. He kissed her and they'd fallen back onto the bed, reveling in the knowledge that they'd found one another in this life and couldn't be happier. Saying it was bliss wouldn't be going too far.

/

A few days later, they were eating dinner together as usual, and when they were mostly finished, they'd gotten into a discussion about good and evil. This point had come from discussing the potential whereabouts of Melody, who Chris had just never been able to get an angle on, to the freelance agent responsible for taking her in the first place. He'd tried to track Ada for over a year since the warehouse where she presumably murdered Darius Greene, but had come up empty. Yeah, sure, they were trying to live like everybody else. Living like every other Jack and Jill didn't mean they could pretend their pasts were anything but the usual for the average person.

"Everyone has a dark side I think."

Eva was quick to disagree with him, fervently.

"I don't believe that's true. Definitely not. No. It's not true."

He looked at her. "Why not?"

Chris watched her take a solid intake of breath before responding. "You could never be evil."

He contemplated on where the next part of this conversation might go. Should he validate what she wanted to hear and avoid the full honesty? Did he want this marriage to begin with tiny, harmless lies that could possibly evolve into mistruths bigger and more terrible as things went on? Chris decided to avoid taking such a path. When his life was turning into something so good, he didn't want there to be any chance it would fall to ruin.

"Sometimes, a person can't take what the world throws at them."

She narrowed her eyes, not looking angry, but like she was trying to figure out what he could mean.

"Some people are just bad, Chris. They shouldn't be alive because they only ever do more harm than good. That's not you. That'll never be you because you don't have darkness in you."

His response was immediate. "Nobody's pure good. Everybody messes up, makes mistakes. I'm saying there's that darkness inside, the potential to do some pretty bad stuff. Having a dark side, doesn't necessarily make them evil."

Now she really didn't seem to know what to do with those words. If anything, he may have crossed a line with her he hadn't realized existed. She didn't see that he was trying to speak to her on a more personal level.

"There are evil people out there. You deal with them on an at least semi-regular basis!"

"Eva."

"That's not you though. The people we know like Claire, Leon, even me, are good people. They couldn't possibly be capable of evil acts. Uh uh."

"Eva."

"No, Chris. Listen. I agree nobody's purely good or whatever. But I don't think making mistakes can be considered equal to an act like murder."

"Eva."

"What?!"

She caught herself then, seemingly aware for the first time that she'd been getting more heated and angry as the conversation progressed. Eva took a breath, placed her fork down, and looked away, then back at him. She met his eyes.

"Sorry. Wow, I don't know why I got so..."

"It's okay, but Eva, I'm just telling you, I've come across a lot of types of people in my life. Some are very bad news, but I don't think any of them act without some kind of reason for what they're doing, no matter how misguided or fucked up it is."

"Oh."

He could tell she didn't really understand what he was trying to say.

"The human mind is fragile. The world is a tough place to live and anyone who does it, and does it even remotely decent, should feel good about that. Sometimes a person gives up on trying to really live. I guess that's what I wanted you to hear."

Eva was looking at him real intense-like now. Maybe she was getting what he was saying after all. They both knew people with a very much tapped into dark side. Ada Wong, who they'd just been talking about was one. Her father, Albert Wesker, the elephant topic in the room, was another. Chris decided to go for it since he was tap-dancing on the acceptable line anyhow.

"So, your father's been calling."

The shut down on her end was obvious as her face practically shuttered into a non-responsive, non-revealing, blank expression. She leaned against the back of her seat and crossed her arms over her chest. Defensive position, check. Maybe he shouldn't have said anything. Too late to go back now.

"What does he want?"

"Nothing. I don't care what he wants. I don't care anything about that man any more. He chose to go back to being a stupid crazy scientist trying to change the world forcibly. I'm a scientist trying to make things better. We have nothing to say to each other."

"Okay," he accepted, knowing this was as far as he was going to get here.

"Okay," she said back, and uncrossed her arms.

They returned to eating the rest of the meal and the remainder of the evening passed in relative peace. The television took up the night then, until the time they would need to sleep. Chris was meeting with his team at an ungodly hour because he had to travel in order to get to the hotel where the meet was at. If it meant he could stay with Eva longer, correction, with his wife, he was fine with that.

Staring at the television, he had a thought that made him quietly laugh a little. Observant as she was, Eva noticed and questioned why he was laughing to himself. It was a good question considering the weatherman was currently reporting the possibility of precipitation for the rest of the week. Nothing that could be construed as funny.

"Sorry, I was just thinking, it's been three years."

"Three years before I came and found you again, yeah. That's funny?"

"No, sorry, I mean, it's been more than three years actually, and I've been okay."

She arched an eyebrow at him. "Okay?"

"No serious injuries, no dead teammates, no dying..."

Eva punched him in the arm, hard. He wasn't sure she knew her own strength. He voiced his complaint at the hit and then grinned when she made known her concern.

"You can't die and come back like you used to. You'd actually die and that is not okay."

"I know, I know. I wasn't saying I missed any of that. It's very nice actually, not to have gotten my ass kicked by some freak or slashed up by some monster."

She indulged in a nice smile. He could tell she'd attempted to hold it in and so he continued to grin.

"Well I'm happy you're happy being in actual good health for so long. Do you realize how sad it is that it's something you're amazed about? That actually avoiding near death or horrible injury is a massive accomplishment?"

He went on smiling and put his arm around her shoulders. "I'm okay with that."

She laughed. He loved the sound.

/

The following day, he left before the sun came up, and Eva watched him go like she always did. She got up with him on those early mornings, placed her hand on the window in a sort of frozen wave goodbye that got his heart beating harder than usual, and then he would go. Already he knew it was going to be a good day.

By the end of the week, he was still riding that high of the good life. His team remained inactive because bio-terrorism was at an all time low of late, they were relaxing more and more, each of them considering returning to the civilian life. At work, Eva was possibly on the verge of a new and improved cure for the parasite Las Plagas, that could potentially still be a threat in the future. His sister texted to tell him she hated him, and he knew it meant she'd called Leon, finally, and something had come of it. Apparently New York boyfriend Kevin, the carbon copy of Leon, was officially the latest ex-boyfriend and his sister had gotten some sense about her. It was a good life.

Eva was yet gone from the house one night, having need to stop at the store on her way home from work, when he received a call from Leena. She sounded emotional, telling him she'd gotten a possible location on Melody, and it beyond surprised him. Leena never had the opportunity to meet the young woman but he supposed he had had the team searching for her long enough for it to matter to any of them. Still, the news was fantastic, unbelievable. If this lead actually led to something... He jumped for the details and ended the call just as quickly, grabbing his keys and his weapons belt, ready for anything. If he could find and save Melody from whatever terrible fate had befallen her since he'd seen her in that cryotank a year back, Eva would be thrilled. He took just enough time to scratch out a note and slap it on the fridge. Then he was gone.

/

She came home to find the house empty. Eva found the note within a minute and immediately tried to call his cell. No answer. Not a big deal. She heated up a microwave dinner and ate it in front of the television. She fell asleep after a few hours of mindless TV viewing and when she startled awake from a large explosion on the screen, she shut it off and glanced at the time. It was nearly midnight. She tried reaching Chris again on his cell. No answer. She felt a tightening in her stomach.

Going over to the list of numbers Chris kept in a drawer in the kitchen for her just in case, she dialed the first teammate listed, a Leena Goessing. No answer. She frowned. What could be so important they couldn't answer the phone? She went down to the next number on the list, Rebecca Chambers. She picked up but told her she knew nothing about any possible recovery of Melody. There was no mission she was aware of. On down the list, she came to Keith Rennigan.

"Yeah."

"Keith?"

A pause on the other end before he responded. "Um yeah? Who is this?"

"Are you with Chris?"

"Who's asking?"

"Oh, well I don't know if you know me, but I'm Eva, Chris's-"

He cut her off. "Eva! Yeah I know you. Man, Chris loves talking about you. You're Wesker's kid. You go girl, getting a man like Chris Redfield. Good choice little lady."

She couldn't help but laugh despite her worry. "Hi, yeah, um... Is he with you? Are you meeting up to look for Melody?"

"Melody? No. She's still missing. We have no idea where she is. It's Renny by the way. People call me Renny."

Eva felt that tightening in her stomach again, the final remnants of laughter dying off of her face.

"Chris left a note. It said Leena called with a solid lead on where Melody might be."

"Leena? Nah, she would have told me. We're tight she and I."

She couldn't breathe. Eva wasn't sure how much time passed since the moment Chris's note became invalidated. Eventually though, awareness that Keith was talking to her from the other end of the phone reached her.

"What?" she finally managed to choke out.

"Eva, I'm tracking his cell phone now. He's at a building not too far from your house. My computer says it's an abandoned warehouse. 712 Prairie Lane. No idea why he'd be there but-"

It was Eva's turn to cut him off. "Thank you."

She hung up and ran out the door. Flipping on the GPS, she typed in the coordinates and peeled out of the driveway. Five dangerous minutes on the road later, she made it to the address and practically hurtled out of the car, yanking the stored gun out from under the driver's seat in the same motion.

She didn't find Chris in that place. She found a woman, around Chris's age, lying slumped against a wall. Eva could tell she was hurt, bad. There was blood all over her clothes, on part of the floor, and parts of the wall. As she moved closer, she could see a most horrible sight. Her guts were literally falling into her lap, mostly held in by hands trying to push them back where they belonged.

For being so injured, the woman was doing a decent job keeping it together. There were tears running down her cheeks but she wasn't screaming or crying out her suffering. And she had to have been in incredible pain. The woman's breathing was heavy, murmuring to herself the same thing over and over.

"They made me call him here. They made me call him here. They made me. They made me call him here."

Eva knelt down beside the woman, dialing 911 even as she did so. "Leena? Is your name Leena?"

The woman raised her head up towards her, eyes a bit dazed, face pale. Even in such a condition, Eva could tell she was pretty. She shook the stray thought away to listen as the woman talked.

"They killed him. They said they just wanted to talk to him about Wesker. They killed him. They killed him and took him away. Oh God..."

She tried to hold it together as she looked around the room at all the blood, and then back to the woman. She felt like she was going to throw up. The stench of blood was overwhelming and the fear for Chris was becoming too much to keep herself composed.

"I'm going to assume you're Leena Goessing. Help is on the way. Now please, can you tell me where Chris is? Was he here? What happened?"

"They made me call him here. They killed him. I loved him and I betrayed him. This, this is a deserved death."

"No, no, no."

Leena was slumping further down against the wall.

"Leena, I need you to tell me what happened to Chris. Who did this to you? Where is he?"

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. They made me call him here. This is..deserved. Chris..."

Glazed over eyes and a limp head falling down to chest. Eva knew she wouldn't get anything more out of her. She was dead. She let the sob erupt from her throat in that moment. Where the hell was Chris? Where was he?

Leena Goessing's mother was found dead in her home later that night. Local police believed the older woman had been taken hostage, and Leena was used to get Chris to come to the warehouse. The police were no help, the FBI, even less so. There would be no solace for her. Chris was falling away and she couldn't stop it. She clung onto a desperate hope that her happiness wouldn't just be gone like that. Chris, could not just be gone like that. She hoped.


	12. To Die Young

_Present Day_

 

_Sterling, Colorado_

It might seem all about heartache and pain. But in the last six years, there have been far more happy moments than sad. Perspective. That's what the therapist was always pointing out, trying to make Eva see the big picture. Today was a good day, but it was still laughable to be told about perspective sometimes. Like in this moment, her therapist was once again explaining her “driver” theory of life.

“You are the driver of your own life. You decide just how much happiness there will be. It's the things you choose to care about. Those are the things which come to define you.”

Eva shifted in the overly comfortable chair and leaned forward. Meanwhile Dr. Molly Sheffel was sitting across from her in a stiff-backed chair with a posture slightly leaning back, one leg crossed over the other. Every time they did this little dance, she wondered if she was actually trying to help or testing her. The woman had been her therapist every week for nearly a year. Recommended to her as soon as she found out, as soon as it was certain.

“Stories are defined by their endings.”

Her therapist gave away her eagerness to listen by uncrossing and then recrossing her legs. She folded her hands over a knee and intently awaited what Eva had to say next. So she didn't say anything.

Proudly she watched her therapist take the silence in stride. Good lady.

“So you think if a particular story has a sad ending, it isn't a good story?”

She said nothing, leading Molly to say more.

“I would argue the exact opposite. Sometimes sad endings result from the greatest stories. Sometimes, even though we may view those endings to be sad, they aren't.”

Her therapist had clearly learned to talk at people, hoping something got through to them. Many sessions had gone by where Eva chose to say very little or nothing at all. She wasn't a huge fan of talking about herself. She wasn't a huge fan of therapists either. Most appointments, she came to listen to a professional hired to make her feel better. Though it was of the opinion of this particular therapist, that her purpose be to make Eva decide to live her life fully.

“People like us don't get happy endings.” Eva murmured, a remembrance.

“Hm?” the therapist inquired curiously.

“That's what he said to me once. We'd been through hell and made it and that's what he said.”

“Chris?” Molly knowingly assumed.

Eva nodded her head slowly. “Yes. I don't think I understood exactly what he was saying then, but I do now.”

“Okay. What was he saying? What did Chris mean?”

“He only meant that we might not be happy all the time, or get fairytale endings of wealth and fortune. But there would be times of happiness. And he meant it was a choice. He chose to spend his life working to get other people their happy endings, and the cost was his own happy end. As long as I picked the same life he had, I'd be the same. That's what he was telling me.”

Molly clapped her hands together and smiled broadly. “Well put. What do you need me for? Sounds like you've had a massive breakthrough.”

“I get it. I get what you've been saying every time we meet and I get now what Chris meant all those years ago.” She could hear herself getting angry, but didn't care. “I get that there's good and bad. That's the world. That's life!”

She sank into herself, curling up a bit in the chair, placing her head between her knees. She was crying. She hated when she cried during therapy, in front of someone who knew everything about her, yet remained a total stranger. Her next words came out in barely a whisper.

“But why does there have to be so much bad?”

“Eva?”

Her head stayed between her knees, face hidden away as she worked to voice her thoughts.

“You know, I didn't think about him at all yesterday.”

She didn't have to say a name. Whenever she was nonspecific, it was always about Chris.

“Not until I woke up the following morning, did I touch this,” she felt for the locket hanging from the choker and grasped it between three fingers. “And think of him.”

Relief flooded her, pure and real, and she wiped her eyes. She sat up and placed herself correctly in the chair once again. Leaning forward, she placed her elbows on her knees, hands under her chin. She regarded Molly for a quiet moment.

“I think I've finally let him go.”

Molly smiled gently. “This is a very important accomplishment, Eva.”

“There are no more tears left for him. But, I'm afraid...”

“Go on. What are you afraid of?”

“For my children. Chris's end, fine. It's done. It happened and it was the fuckin' worst thing in the world to me, and it's done. I can handle my end too. But what about them?”

“Eva.”

“I know Leon and Claire will do it. I mean, it may be harder for Leon than Claire, but Claire will be amazing for it. I trust them both.”

“Have you talked to them yet? Have you asked? This is a monumental thing that you need them to take on. It's not nothing.”

“No. No, I haven't asked them yet. I haven't told anyone.”

“Not even your aunt? The two of you are so close. Why not entrust the children to her?

“My aunt is too old to take on kids as young as them. I wouldn't put that on her. And besides, Claire and Leon have just got engaged. I know they'll marry and stay together and I'd like my children to have both a mother and a father.”

“What about your father? You haven't even told him about your circumstances?”

She laughed. Oh, if this lady knew everything about her father. If this lady truly knew exactly what history had recorded of her father, or Chris for that matter, this therapy would be an entirely different beast. Never would she go that honest with some stranger. She'd really be seen as a hopeless case then.

“I only told him about having kids a few days ago. I wasn't going to drop another bomb on him like that.”

“Why don't you ask him to come see you? And the kids. It would be good for all of you.”

“You don't know my father.”

“No, and you won't talk about him. An absent father during childhood can be extremely difficult. Many of my clients have had only one parent or absent parents. It's a tough burden to bear when so young and has lasting effects. But it does sound like your father wants to be involved in your life. You, yourself, told me you were the one to cut him out of your life seven years ago. Maybe it's time to let him back in.”

“Look, I love my father.”

Molly waited patiently. Eva stared at her and added, “I hate him, too.”

“Whatever he did to garner such hatred, I'm sure he deserved your self-appointed exile. And maybe it was the right thing to do at the time. But now, now you have children to think about. A grandfather would be an incredible gift with the absence of any father-figure so far.”

She scoffed at the idea. “Grandfather? He wouldn't be a grandfather or a role-model. He'd just use them every chance he got.”

“Use them?” her therapist asked, confusion evident. “How would he use them?”

Whoops. A bit too close to exposing some truth she wasn't about to expose. She would go to her grave with the identity of her father.

“I just don't think he'd be the best influence for my kids.”

Molly accepted her avoidance and went on. “You keep coming here every week and talk about how you're taking care of things, accepting the hand that's been dealt to you, which is good. What's not so good, is I don't think you've completely accepted the reality of what's happening.”

“Of course I have. What are you talking about?”

“You haven't told anyone yet.”

“So?”

“Until you do, you're in denial.”

“I'm not denying anything.”

“Really?”

“I've been through that. I explored every option there is, cursed the skies, and been through the worst depression I've ever known. I've accepted it. I have.”

“You have friends and family, but you isolate yourself all the same. You won't tell anyone because you think you can deal with this alone. You can't. No one can and no one should have to.”

Silence. It must have been a full five minutes of only the quiet ticking of the grandfather clock along the wall. Then her therapist spoke again.

“You have to make the most of the time you've been given.”

“I want to.”

“Then the first step is to tell somebody what you're dealing with. It can be anybody. Someone close, or even a complete stranger on the street. Just tell someone.”

For some reason, Eva thought about Melody then. Someone she befriended fairly quickly despite her quirkiness. Someone she'd known, liked, and lost almost as fast. A stranger could become someone important, and she didn't think she had it in her to lose any more people. Soon enough, she was going to lose everything. This was acceptance enough, wasn't it?

“You know, through all of these sessions, I don't think you've ever said it out loud. Go on, admit out loud to this room.”

She felt kind of tired now. Remembering the past, or even her present situation, did that to her a lot. She was happy, but she was unhappy. What sense did that make? What sense did life ever make?

“Admit what?”

“Your reality, Eva.”

“My reality?”

She straightened her posture and looked her therapist in the eyes. Bright blue against the murky brown of Molly's eye color hidden behind thick lenses.

“I'm dying.”

/

Perusing the cereal aisle was, oh, so fascinating and fun. She traced her fingers along the edges of cereal boxes as she contemplated what sugary triumph would be chosen to corrupt her children this week. So many options but so little time. Natasha would be expecting her home any minute now.

She glanced back at the cart left further down the lane and made her pick. Grabbing one of her personal favorites off the shelf, she tossed it toward her cart without bothering to look. Hearing a click as it hit metal and then the sound of a soft landing, possibly on top of her bread, she grinned. She still had some skill.

“Whoah! Careful now. Nicely done.”

Eva turned in surprise. A man her age stood behind her shopping cart. He wore a dark blue t-shirt, blue jeans, and a black jacket with the collar turned up so he looked like an asshole. That was her brother.

“What are you doing here, Jake?”

“Seriously? No hi, nice to see you after it's been, what? Two years?”

“Three. Doesn't feel long enough. I have to go.”

He put his hands on her shopping cart and steered it over to her. “You're in a good mood.”

“I am in a good mood. Just not in the mood to deal with you.”

“Deal with-What is your problem?”

When he frowned, the faded scar on his cheek that had not healed right shifted. She found herself staring at it for a moment. She'd never asked him how he got it. She never really cared to ask him much of anything ever. They had the same father. They got along well enough, but they had the same father.

She sighed loudly and folded her arms over her chest. “What?”

“What what?”

“You expect me to believe this is a coincidence, you running into me like this? This is my town, not yours.”

“Wow. Impatient as always I see.”

“To the point. I have to get home.”

“Right. Kids.”

She balked. Wesker must have spoken to him. Apparently it had been a wise choice to cut her half brother out of her life nearly as much as she had with her father. They talked to each other. He seemed to read what troubled her mind.

“Yeah, I talk to him. Guilty of being his kid too. He's not gonna win any father of the year awards, but he's trying.”

Eva gave him an incredulous look. “Really?”

There was no belief anywhere in her voice. This was clearly still an interrogation of him and he saw that. She waited for him to get to the explaining. He didn't. He was busy being upset.

“I can't believe you never told me you had kids. I find out Sherry knew, Rebecca and Billy, Renny... You went out of your way to tell everyone but family. You know how messed up that is?”

“My aunt knows. She's a big part of their life. You didn't need to be. Last I heard, you were off doing missions with Sherry for the government.”

“Leon got us a gig to keep ourselves busy, useful, yeah.” He paused and growled a little. “That guy knew too. Son of a-”

“Look. What is it, Jake? What do you need from me?”

He released his hold on her cart and wandered away from her a bit. Scratching his chin, he examined the cereal lining the shelves she had only been doing a minute ago. He selected a chocolate cereal and tucked the box under his arm before turning back to her.

“Finding you here actually was a coincidence, Eva. Being in town, not so much. We came to see you.”

“We?”

“Sherry and me.”

She relaxed somewhat. For a moment there, she'd worried her father had actually come to town. Then again, he'd be more likely to bust down her door and demand to know how she came to produce offspring. Like he couldn't guess how that happened.

“We were thinking of getting the team together.”

Eva didn't understand that at all. “The team? Why? And why would you see me about it?”

“Well, you know how dad's been working on a new world order. Yet, it's seven years now and we haven't seen it.”

“Thank God for that.”

“I think he's delaying.”

“What do you mean?”

Jake ran a hand across his scalp, hair shaved close to the skull as usual. A habit from his mercenary days undoubtedly. He looked hard at her.

“I think Wesker's avoiding it. Because of us. I mean think about it. Before he didn't really have anything to hang on to, to keep him sane and grounded.”

Eva bit her tongue about how he'd had her. She knew how much losing his wife, her mother, had gravely darkened his view of the world. For a time, nothing mattered but revenge on Umbrella. He'd listened when she'd asked him to give up his Uroboros plans though. She'd mattered then.

“Now, he's got us. He's got Sherry sort of too. I mean, we're his legacy. His claim to the world if he wants it. No fame or crazy evolution of all mankind, but something I know he wants.”

She wished with all her heart that was what her father wanted. But how could she believe that? He learned she had kids of her own and he hadn't come.

Jake finished. “I don't think he wants to mess that up. Having him hang around someone like Chris for as long as he did probably didn't help him maintain his evil nature any either.”

“So you think he's changed.”

“I do. He's more human than I've ever seen him.”

“But he's not human, not really.”

His lips twisted into a wry smile. “Not a regular human by any means, but that doesn't necessarily make him inhuman, Eva. I mean, Chris wasn't technically human for years himself. Didn't make him any less of who he'd been before the change. He was my friend and comrade. When it comes to Wesker, heck Chris too, I believe it's the regular people that help the not so regular people keep their humanity. It's what I make of it anyway.”

“Please stop bringing up Chris.”

He frowned but then relaxed his expression and shrugged his shoulders. “Right, sorry. All I'm saying is, Wesker's looking to investigate the recent rise in terrorism, possibly by the same guy, and we could use you on our side if things get ugly. We all could.”

Eva stared without uttering a word. Was this a joke? He had to be joking. She hadn't been a member of their team before, and she wasn't joining into a life of violence with Chris dead from it. She had kids to think about. Her response came easily.

“No.”

“Oh.” He sort of craned his neck away from her, then back. “Not at all interested that Wesker is looking to continue the work Chris would probably be doing if he were still here. Not at all interested that Wesker has put his own work on hold to do this.”

“Why would he? It doesn't make sense.”

“No, but I won't argue when I like the direction he's heading in.”

She shook her head and uncrossed her arms, moving to get a grip on the side of her cart. Starting to push the cart down the aisle, she turned back to him.

“If Wesker's looking into the bio-terrorism that's been taking place over the past year, there must be something for him to gain. Probably for his own deadly evolution project. I won't be a part of it.”

“Damn, you really hate him.”

Jake looked startled by what she had to say. He shouldn't. Wesker was a bad man. Had been a bad man who made bad things happen for a very long time.

“It's probably unfair I don't see you much because of who our father is,” she admitted. “But I truly believe if he wasn't the man he is, Chris would be alive today.”

She started pushing her cart along the aisle, deciding if she needed anything else she would come back another time. Right now she wanted to get home to her kids. She began to push her run-in with Jake to the back of her mind where she could ignore it, at least for a while. He had final words for her though. Words she would have trouble removing from her thoughts the rest of the evening.

“Wesker didn't kill Chris. Maybe it's time you stop seeing everything as a result of those two.”

Eva kept pushing the cart along, steering it out of the aisle and towards the checkout. Never did she look back at her brother. She was very tired.


End file.
